Jeffery Deaver - Carte Blanche

The guards looked at each other and apparently decided to share the glory of murdering the man who had brought down Gehenna and killed several of their fellow workers.

They both raised their black weapons to their shoulders.

But just as Bond was about to dive to the ground in a hopeless bid to avoid the slugs, there was a crash behind him. A white van had ploughed through the gate, sending chain-link and razor wire flying. Now the vehicle skidded to a stop and the doors opened. A tall man in a suit, wearing body armour under his jacket, leapt out and began firing at the two guards.

It was Kwalene Nkosi, nervous and tense, but standing his ground.

The guards returned fire, though only to cover their retreat east, deeper into the Green Way facility. They disappeared into the brush. Bond glimpsed Dunne, who was surveying the situation calmly. He turned and sprinted in the same direction as the guards.

Bond picked up the weapon he’d been using and ran to the police vehicle. Bheka Jordaan climbed out and stood beside Nkosi, who was looking around for more targets. Gregory Lamb peered out and stepped cautiously to the ground. He carried a large 1911 Colt.45.

‘You decided to come to the party after all,’ Bond said to her.

‘I thought it wouldn’t hurt to drive here with some other officers. While we were waiting nearby up the road I heard gunshots. I suspected poaching, which is a crime. That was sufficient cause to enter the premises.’

She didn’t seem to be joking. He wondered if she had prepared the lines for her superiors. If so, she needed to work on her delivery, Bond decided.

Jordaan said, ‘I brought a small team with me. Sergeant Mbalula and some other officers are securing the main building.’

Bond told her, ‘Hydt’s in there – or was. His three partners too. I’d assume they’re armed by now. There’ll be other guards.’ He explained where the hostiles had been and gave a rough geography of the headquarters. Jessica’s office, too. He added that the older woman had helped him; she would not be a threat.

At a nod from the captain, Nkosi, keeping low, started for the building.

Jordaan sighed. ‘We had trouble getting back-up. Hydt’s being protected by somebody in Pretoria. But I called a friend in the Recces – our special-forces brigade. A team is on its way. They aren’t so much concerned about politics; they look for any excuse to fight. But it’ll be twenty or thirty minutes before they arrive.’

Suddenly Gregory Lamb stiffened. Crouching low, he lumbered south, towards a stand of trees. ‘I’ll flank them.’

Flank them? Flank who ?

‘Wait,’ Bond shouted. ‘There’s nobody there. Go with Kwalene! Secure Hydt.’

But the big man seemed not to have heard and plodded over the ground like an elderly Cape buffalo, disappearing into the brush. What the hell was he doing?

Just then a few rounds peppered the ground near them. Bond and Jordaan dropped to the ground. He forgot about Lamb and looked for a target.

Several hundred yards away Dunne and the two men with him had regrouped and paused in their retreat, firing back at their pursuers. Bullets hit near the van but caused no damage or injury. The three men vanished behind piles of rubbish on the edge of Disappearance Row, the seagull population thinning as the birds fled from the gunfire.

Bond jumped into the driver’s seat of the van. In the back, he was pleased to see half a dozen large containers of ammunition. He started the engine. Jordaan ran to the passenger side. ‘I’m coming with you,’ she said.

‘Better if I do this myself.’ He suddenly recalled Philly Maidenstone’s recitation of Kipling’s verse, which he’d decided was not a bad battle cry.

Down to Gehenna or up to the throne, He travels the fastest who travels alone…

But Jordaan jumped into the seat beside him and slammed the door. ‘I said I’d fight by your side if it was legal to do so. Now it is. So go! They’re getting away.’

Bond hesitated only a moment, then slammed the van into first and they bounded off down the dirt roads that gridded the huge complex, past Silicon Row, Resurrection Row, the power plants.

And rubbish, of course – millions of tons of it: paper, carrier bags, bits of dull and shiny metal, fragments of ceramic and food scraps, over which the eerie canopy of frantic seagulls was reassembling.

It was hard driving as they swerved around earth-moving equipment, skips and bales of refuse awaiting burial, but at least the winding route gave Dunne and the two guards no easy target. The three men turned and fired sporadically but were concentrating mostly on escaping.

On her radio Jordaan called in and reported where they were and whom they were pursuing. The special-forces team would not arrive for at least another thirty minutes, Bond heard the dispatcher tell her.

Just as Dunne and the other men reached the fence separating the filthy sprawl of the plant from the reclaimed area, one guard spun around and fired an entire magazine their way. The rounds pounded the front grille and tyres. The van jerked sideways, out of control, and ploughed head first into a pile of paper bales. The air bags deployed and Bond and Jordaan sat stunned.

Seeing that their enemy was down, Dunne and the other guards began firing in earnest.

Amid the sound of bullets slamming into sheet metal, Bond and Jordaan rolled out of the shuddering vehicle and into a ditch. ‘You injured?’ he asked.

‘No. I… It’s so loud!’ Her voice quivered but her eyes told Bond she was successfully fighting down her fear.

From beneath the wing of the van, Bond had a good shot at one of their adversaries and, lying prone, he aimed with the automatic.

One round left.

He squeezed the trigger – but the instant the firing pin hit primer, the man ducked. He was gone when the bullet arrived.

Bond grabbed an ammunition box and ripped off the lid. It contained only.223 rounds, for rifles. The second held the same. In fact, they all did. There were no 9mm pistol rounds. He sighed and looked through the van. ‘Do you have anything that’ll shoot these?’ He gestured at the wealth of useless bullets.

‘No assault rifles. All I have is this.’ She drew her own weapon. ‘Here, you take it.’

The pistol was a Colt Python, a.357-calibre magnum – powerful and boasting a tight cylinder lock-up and superb pull. A good weapon. But it was a revolver, holding only six rounds.

No, he corrected when he checked. Jordaan was a conservative gun owner and kept the chamber under the hammer empty. ‘Speedloader? Loose rounds?’

‘No.’

So, they had five bullets against three adversaries with semi-automatic weapons. ‘You’ve never heard of Glocks?’ he muttered, slipping the empty one into his back waistband and weighing the Colt in his palm.

‘I investigate crimes,’ she replied coolly. ‘I don’t have much occasion to shoot people.’

Though when those rare instances do arise, he thought angrily, it would be helpful to have the right tool. He said, ‘You go back. Just keep to cover.’

She was looking steadily into his eyes, sweat beading at her temples, where her luxurious black hair frothed. ‘If you’re going after them I’m coming with you.’

‘Without a weapon, there’s nothing you can do.’

Jordaan glanced to where Dunne and the others had disappeared. ‘They have a number of guns and we only have one. That’s not fair. We must take one away from them.’

Well, maybe Captain Bheka Jordaan had a sense of humour, after all.

They shared a smile and in her fierce eyes Bond saw the reflection of orange flames from the burning methane. It was a striking image.