Return Fire (Sam Archer ) (29 page)

FIFTY SEVEN

Crouching in the blood-spattered office beside Vargas and holding Dash’s pistol, Archer desperately look
ed around for another way out. There wasn’t one, and the handgun was all he had apart from a flash-bang, a smoke grenade and a knife.

The man next door had an automatic weapon, ammunition, both exits covered and no doubt a pistol for Talia.

There was no sign of back up yet either.

‘Shit!’

‘What do we do?’ Vargas said frantically, still staring at the blood-stained transparent sheets and the body parts. ‘Sam?’

Cursing, he looked around desperately. Behind them was a bathroom, obviously servicing the main office beyond as well as this one when it was in use, and to their left was a load of workman’s gear, tools, bags of nails and a small rubbish bin with some old food wrappers visible inside.

There was nothing.

As Vargas backed away further from the door, her grey nightclothes dirtied and stained with dried blood, Archer suddenly paused.

Looking at the rubbish bin and nails to his left, he thought back to his flight from New York to London earlier in the day.

And his conversation with Marquez
about fear.

In the main office, Piccadilly suddenly let rip on the door with his AR-15, blowing pieces of it apart. It was returned a second later, rounds from a silenced pistol hitting the door, which was exactly what he and Talia wanted, knowing the pair trapped inside would eventually run out of ammo.

All they had to do was provoke Archer into firing until his guns clicked dry and the return fire would cease.

Kneeling inside the bathroom as Vargas fired at the door with Dash’s pistol, Archer frantically pulled open the doors under the washbasin and found some cleaning products lined up inside.

Including an industrial-size container of bleach.

Grabbing it, he moved back into the room, then rummaged through the rubbish bin, praying he’d find what he was looking for.

If he didn’t, they were going to die.

Seconds later, his heart skipped a beat. It was there.

Reaching inside, he withdrew a rolled up ball of foil from an eaten sandwich, just as Vargas fired the last round and the slide on the pistol stayed back.

‘Rip this into smaller pieces!’ he told Vargas quickly, passing her the ball of foil.

Puzzled but doing what he said without question, she dropped the pistol and after quickly unravelling the ball, started tearing up the aluminium wrap. Realising they needed more time, Archer saw the gunfire had blown a hole into the upper part of the door; he pulled the last stun grenade from his pocket, ripped the pin, stalked forward then popped it through the hole, both of them covering up as the flash-bang went off.

Using every precious second it bought him, Archer unscrewed the bleach, instantly getting a hi
t of the harsh chemical smell.

As Vargas continued to rip the foil into smaller pieces, Archer grabbed a bag of nails the workmen had left behind.

He then tipped them all into the bottle as fast as he could.

Talia and Piccadilly had just been advancing on the door when the stun grenade had come through, taking them by surprise and giving them no time to cover up.

As they waited for their senses to return, Talia smiled through the momentary discomfort.

Archer’s return fire had stopped.

He was out of ammo.

With the whole bag of nails now inside the bleach, Archer grabbed the strips of foil Vargas had prepared and stuffed them inside.
As soon as he fed the last piece in, he screwed on the cap and shook it frantically, starting the chemical reaction.

Moving forward, he placed the bottle in the centre of the room then took a smoke grenade from his vest, ripping the pin and laying it beside the bleach.

Walking forward silently, both Talia and Piccadilly approached the door, just as there was a crack and a hissing sound.

Smoke suddenly started to drift through the gaps in the shot-up door.

She grinned. They’d used a smoke grenade to hamper visibility, but all they were doing was delaying the inevitable by a few seconds. They’d unwittingly taken cover inside the room Talia had used to kill Finchley; she smiled at the irony.

In front of her, Piccadilly kicked the damaged frame back. Smoke was filling the space, making it hard to see. The fire alarm didn’t start again though, which meant it must have been disabled. Walking forward with the South African, both of them undeterred by the smoke grenade, they traced the gloom with their weapons.

Searching
for their prey as the smoke grenade
hissed
and filled the silence in the room.

Inside the bathroom, Archer joined Vargas inside the shower stall and covered her, closing his eyes as her fingers gripped onto his tac vest tightly.

He willed the chemical reaction between the foil and bleach to speed up.

C’mon!

Clutching his vest, Vargas held him close as smoke flowed into the room behind them.

C’mon!

As Talia and Piccadilly moved through the smoke, brushing aside the transparent sheets spattered with Finchley’s blood, the South African mercenary’s foot suddenly hit something as he stepped forward.

He glanced down, Talia pausing just behind him, her gaze followed his.

There was a large container of bleach sitting on the floor beside the grenade.

Puzzled, Talia glanced at the South African, who shrugged.

Shifting their attention, they focused on the bathroom to their right.

The rest of th
e office was empty.

Archer and Vargas would be in there.

In the smoke, Piccadilly turned to Talia and nodded, smiling. But as she went to react, she suddenly saw movement out of the corner of her eye. He saw her expression and turned back to face the bottle of bleach.

T
he container on the floor suddenly expanded.

Like a balloon about to burst.

FIFTY EIGHT

Inside the shower stall and shielding Vargas, Archer heard the blast and two screams as boiling hot bleach and the nails he’d dropped into the fluid exploded outwards from the chemical reaction in a makeshift nail-bomb. Waiting a few seconds longer, Vargas holding onto him tightly, Archer turned and saw no one had entered the bathroom.

Smoke continued to drift into the room from the grenade.

He looked back at Vargas, who stared up at him, her eyes wide with confusion. Rising and pushing open the shower door, Archer crept cautiously towards the door of the smoke-filled bathroom. As he edged towards the entrance, completely unarmed, he peered round and saw the blond man from the lift on the floor.

He was dead, his skin and clothing covered with burning chemicals, nails buried in his face
, neck and torso, his eyes open as the bleach bubbled on his burned face.

However, Talia was nowhere to be seen.

Grabbing a hand towel from the bathroom, Archer pulled off the dead man’s shoes, passing them to Vargas behind him. She wouldn’t need them for long, just to walk over the floor out of this office. As she slipped them on distastefully, Archer reached forward and scooped up the dead man’s AR-15, his hand protected from the bleach on the grip by the rag.

All the while, the office continued to be clouded by smoke from the grenade.

And he couldn’t see Talia anywhere.

Checking the clip and
then tracing through the gloom, Archer took a deep breath then led the way as they walked through the aftermath of the explosion towards the door to the main office, holding their breath from the noxious fumes. With Vargas behind him, covering her mouth, they both moved slowly, Archer scanning the room with the assault rifle as he searched for Talia.

He could see the transparent, blood-covered sheets closest to him had been partially ripped by the explosion, the air stinking with the smell of burning chemicals, parts of the sheets smoking from the boiling bleach.

Checking that the main office beyond was empty, Archer stopped in the open doorway, unable to see shit through the smoke.

Vargas joined him, covering her mouth as she too searched through the thick smoke.

Where the hell was Talia?

Suddenly, there were two quick muzzle flashes from the other side of the small office.

Two rounds from a suppressed pistol pounded into Archer’s chest. His vest absorbed the impact but it caught him off guard and knocked the wind out of him, throwing him back into the main office
floor through the destroyed open door behind him. Fortunately, the rounds came from a .22 pistol, not a shotgun so he recovered fast and snapped up the AR-15 to return fire.

But through the swirling smoke he saw Vargas standing very still.

And Talia’s outline right beside her.

He also saw
she had her pistol jammed into the side of Vargas’ neck.

‘Drop t
he gun,’ Talia’s voice ordered.

This time, there was no chance sh
e’d miss. Archer had no choice.

H
e let go of the assault rifle and it hit the floor.

A moment later, Talia swept the gun off Vargas and
shot Archer again, hitting him in the vest and knocking him back another step. Vargas jolted as the pistol fired then Talia prodded her forward, pushing her into the main office. Reaching Archer, she turned and they both saw Talia more clearly as she walked towards them through the smoke.

She looked like something out of a nightmare.

Her face, arms and body had been hideously burned by the bleach. Several thick black nails were buried in her left side, drawing blood.

O
ne was also embedded through the side of her left eye.

Standing there
, Vargas beside him, Archer stared at Talia. Her skin still burning from the boiling chemicals, with her pistol pointed right at them, Talia stared straight back, blood leaking from the nail jutting out of the side of her eye. She must have been in excruciating pain; how she was still standing was beyond comprehension. The guy next door must have partially shielded her from the blast.

‘You said earlier that this was the last thing my son e
ver saw,’ she hissed at Archer, aiming the Ruger directly at him. ‘I guess as you said, we really have come full circle.’

She hawked and spat blood and saliva at him, the bleach burning into her skin as Archer braced himself, ready to launch
himself forward with his back against the wall. Pistols could miss; his vest had already absorbed three rounds from the Ruger and if he moved fast he could get to her before she could put him down. However, keeping the pistol on him Talia suddenly knelt down and scooped up the AR-15 Archer had dropped, tossing the Ruger to one side, the bleach on the weapon immediately burning into her hands.

And Archer knew he was going to die.

Now just six feet from the pair, Talia lifted the assault rifle into her shoulder and put the sights on Archer’s forehead. From this range with an automatic weapon, it was a done deal.

‘Just do me one favour,’ she
said, aiming at his head. ‘When you see Dominick, tell him who sent you.’

‘Tell him yourself,
’ another voice suddenly added.

Keeping the AR-15 on Archer and Vargas, Talia’s head swung round in shock.

And propped up in the stairwell door with Archer’s Glock in his hand, Chalky pulled the trigger and shot her between the eyes.

The moment she took the round, Talia was thumped backwards, the assault rifle flying out of her hands as the bullet hit her right in the middle of the forehead. As the rear of her head blew apart, she fell to the floor in a heap, the single gunshot echoing down the stairwell behind Chalky.

Then everything was quiet.

Staring at her dead body, Vargas beside him, Archer stood still against the far wall for a moment, absorbing what had just happened.

Then he
looked over at his best friend, who lowered the gun and slumped down to the floor in the doorframe.

Archer quickly moved over to him, Vargas going to Talia and kicking
the weapons near her away.

‘Christ, am I glad to see you,’ Archer said, dropping to his knee by his friend.

‘Thought you’d end up…needing some help,’ Chalky said, his face pale from blood loss.

He turned his attention to Vargas as she joined them, forcing a smile.

‘Finally we meet. Now I see…why he’s gone to…all this trouble.’

She smiled back as she knelt d
own and gripped his free hand. Archer turned his attention to Chalky’s arm and the makeshift bandage he’d tied on earlier which had slipped down.

Adjusting
it, he looked at his friend and smiled.

‘You left it pretty bloody late, didn’t you?’

‘You know I like…to make an entrance,’ Chalky replied, grinning weakly.

Turning, Archer looked over at Talia Farha’s dead body, the mother of the first man he’d ever had to kill. As he did so, the trio heard distant shouts of
police
from down the stairwell, back-up finally here.

He look
ed back at his friend. ‘Thanks, Chalk.’

‘After what you did for me…earlier…I guess now…we’re even,’ Chalky said.

With smoke still swirling around the office floor, the three of them waited there by the stairwell door for back-up, finally out of danger, Dash, Talia and their entire team gone.

‘Yeah,’ Archer said. ‘I guess we are.’