Tom Cain - Carver

Carver didn’t have time to finish the first target off. The second was already steadying himself and bringing his gun to bear on the buggy. Carver went for a head shot. Two more quick-fire rounds hit their target, splattering a mess of scarlet blood and grey brain matter against the stark, bare breeze blocks.

Eight rounds used, seven left in the magazine. Three men down…

No, make that two.

The man Carver had wounded was struggling to his feet. He switched his gun to his left hand, and staggered forwards.

Carver winced as he killed him with a pair of shots to the chest, almost resenting his victim for forcing such a clinical execution rather than being smart enough to count himself lucky and stay down.

He pointed his gun up at the neon strip lights and fired off the rest of his rounds, throwing that section of the tunnel into semidarkness. Then he released the magazine, slammed in a new one and passed the gun to Alix. ‘Get round the next corner, then wait for me,’ he said. ‘If I don’t come for you, shoot whoever does.’

Carver got out of the buggy and she drove away. He jumped up and grabbed hold of the framework that ran along the ceiling, carrying the red pipes, wires and shot-out neon lights. Then he swung his legs up into the framework, and pulled his body up until he was lying flat alongside the pipes and wires, hoping that the thin metal struts that supported them would take his weight as well; hoping, too, that he had taken out enough lights to hide his presence from the other Chinese, who must now have realized that they had gone in the wrong direction, and be doubling back his way.

Carver reached down to his leg and slipped the knife from his ankle sheath.

More voices came, two of them, one higher-pitched than the other. Their words were indecipherable, but the questioning tone was clear. They were calling out for their mates, and wondering why there was no reply. Seconds later the owners of the voices came into view: a shaven-headed, thickset guy who looked like he could handle himself, and a slip of a girl in a sexy little mini. They both glanced at their dead comrades. The girl visibly flinched, then pulled herself together, advancing down the tunnel at a slow, steady pace beside the man. They had their guns in front of them, alert to the slightest sound or movement.

They were almost directly under Carver now.

Then there was a strangled cry for help, the sound of a man too terrified to be able to raise his voice. The buggy driver slid back down the pipe towards the tunnel floor and the two Chinese turned in his direction, presenting their backs to Carver. The girl swung her gun until the barrel pointed directly at the wide-eyed screaming driver, her face clenched into flint-eyed immobility as she put three shots in a tight grouping right in the centre of his skinny torso. They blasted bloody chunks out of his back as they passed right through him.

The sound of the firing was still echoing around the tunnel as Carver slipped down from his hiding place, his feet hitting the concrete directly behind the shaven-headed man. His left hand clamped over the man’s mouth as the knife in his right cut into the flesh of his neck and, in a single sweep from left to right, severed the windpipe and the carotid artery, sending a spray of blood pluming through the air in a downward arc. The man fell dead at Carver’s feet.

The young woman turned round to meet this unexpected threat, and Carver threw himself at her, reaching out for her gun with his empty hand and stabbing the knife up towards her guts.

The knife never got there. Carver felt the woman’s slim hand clamp against his wrist, her grip surprisingly powerful, crushing enough to cut off the supply of blood to his hand and weaken his grip. So now they were locked in a stalemate, each able to prevent the other from using their weapon, but unable to make an attacking move without releasing the grip that was keeping them safe. They stumbled into the centre of the tunnel, turning around in a fatal dance in which each partner was trying to kill the other. The woman was the first to make a move, bringing her right leg round in a scything kick towards the side of Carver’s left leg.

Carver evaded the kick, pulling the woman’s much lighter body with him and taking advantage of her fractional loss of balance to spin her around and then hurl her at the far wall. The woman’s skull hit the breeze blocks with an audible crack, stunning her so that she stood groggily, leaning back against the wall and presenting her body to Carver front on.

A second later the knife that Carver had thrown was embedded in the woman’s delicate, slender throat, and her body was sliding, stone dead, to the hard, cold floor.

Carver waited for a second to see if anyone else was coming, but there was only silence. He stepped across to the corpse and took the gun from the lifeless right hand. Then he sprinted down the corridor toward Alix. Less than a minute had passed since they’d entered the tunnel, and the only un-silenced shots had been the ones that had killed the buggy driver. They would actually serve to keep anyone else away: nowadays no unarmed security men, or even police officers, would advance towards a suspected gunman. The health and safety culture that put the reduction of risk far ahead of the doing of duty would see to that. But that would not prevent the authorities from setting up a security cordon. Unless he and Alix got out fast, they’d be trapped underground like rats in a blocked drain.

He was going flat out round the bend: so fast, in fact, that he slipped and went skidding and scrambling to the floor, accidentally saving his life as the bullets intended for his upright body slammed into the breeze blocks behind him.

Carver tucked his head into his shoulders, turning his fall into a roll, then got straight to his feet, his gun in front of him. He was just about to fire in the direction from which the firing had come when he caught sight of the shooter.

It was the sixth Chinese, the one in the black designer gear: the leader.

He was standing behind the buggy.

He was not pointing his gun at Carver.

He was holding it against the side of Alix’s skull.

Derek Choi could hear more voices echoing down the tunnel, British voices, getting closer. Yet he made no attempt to escape, nor did he bother shouting threats or demands at Carver. As long as he had the Petrova woman at his mercy, Carver could do nothing. In the meantime, Choi was happy to let the time go by until they were all discovered. Carver’s death was really only a means to an end. The ultimate objective was to prevent him getting out of Wimbledon, so that Malachi Zorn could escape. If Choi and Carver both ended up in custody, that aim would be accomplished. Choi carried a diplomatic passport, and his immunity would keep him safe. Carver, though, would have a lot of explaining to do. He might have powerful friends, but they would not help him if the police were conducting a multiple murder investigation. Carver would be left alone to face his fate: the bizarre British obsession with correct procedure would see to that. He would be rotting in jail for the rest of his life.

Carver could see that Alix was looking straight at him. She glanced down for an instant at her feet, then straight back at Carver with a look on her face that said, ‘Shall I?’

He gave a fractional nod of the head, then switched his eyes back to the gunman, stared at him hard and shouted out, ‘Oi! You!’

That got his attention.

At that moment Alix brought up her right knee and then slammed it down again, driving the point of her heel into her captor’s foot, then, as his grip on her loosened, throwing her body down too, and leaving him exposed.

Carver finished the job with two more kill shots.