James Rollins - The Eye of God - A Sigma Force Novel

“All set,” Kowalski said and rolled back to join them, dragging a chair behind him.

“What are you doing?” Pak called over to them.

The three of them crowded behind the chair.

“Fire in the hole!” the big man yelled and pressed the transmitter in his hand.

The blast rocked the room, ringing Gray’s head like a struck bell. Smoke billowed. For a moment, the firefight outside halted as all parties froze at the sudden explosion.

“Go!” Gray yelled, shoving the chair aside.

He prayed the detonation cord had done its job. Otherwise, they were out of luck, as they’d blown Kowalski’s only supply of explosives.

Ahead, the fiery smoldering of burned carpeting glowed through the smoke. A crater had been blasted in the floor—or rather, through the floor. The larger steel trusses were intact, but the explosion had ripped a hole between them.

Gray stared down through the wreckage. He knew the third floor below had an almost identical layout as the fourth. Luckily the VIP room under them was empty.

As the gunfire resumed out in the hallway, sounding even more furious, Gray waved Seichan through first. She slipped between the trusses and smoothly leaped to the floor below.

Gray and Kowalski started to follow, but Hwan Pak tried to interfere, begging for them to take him with them. Kowalski punched out with a fist, as if swatting at a fly. Bone crunched, and Pak flew backward, landing on his backside, blood pouring from his nose.

A moment later, Gray stood next to Seichan by the third-floor door. Kowalski landed heavily behind them.

“Sounds clear out there,” Seichan said, her ear to the door. “But we’ll have to move fast. That ruse won’t last long.”

“We need a way out of this war zone,” Gray warned. “But all the exits from the hotel will be guarded.”

“I may know a way.”

Seichan opened the door, stuck her head out, then bolted into the hallway.

“So how about telling us,” Kowalski groused as he and Gray followed.

Seichan ran for the fire stairs and pounded through the door—only to be faced with a gunman running down from above, leaping steps.

Seichan ducked and hit him low, flipping the assailant over her back.

Gray, a few steps behind, spun on one toe and snap-kicked out with his other leg, catching the flying man in the jaw, cracking his head back. He landed in a crumpled pile.

“Remind me never to get on your bad sides,” Kowalski said.

Gray relieved the Triad member of his weapon, an AK-47 assault rifle. A search quickly revealed a holstered Chinese army Red Star pistol. He tossed the handgun to Kowalski.

“It’s Christmas already?” he mumbled, efficiently checking it over.

“Let’s go!” Seichan urged, poised at the steps leading down, checking the stairwell below.

Gray joined her with the rifle, and they hurried together down the steps, leaping from landing to landing. The firefight above faded slightly. But when they reached the first floor, the exit door began to swing open ahead of them. Whether it was someone seeking refuge or new reinforcements, Gray didn’t care. He fired a spat of rounds, peppering the door.

It quickly closed.

A pistol cracked behind him as Kowalski angled a shot up the stairwell, discouraging anyone from following.

Seichan ignored the first-floor door and continued down toward the basement level. From Gray’s study of the Lisboa, he knew an extensive shopping market tunneled beneath the casino floor. The place was also notorious for its parade of prostitutes, earning the level its nickname, Hooker Mall.

Seichan reached the basement door and cracked it open enough to peek through. It was eerily quiet out there compared to the ruckus above.

She spoke softly. “As I thought, all the shops are barricaded closed.”

Likely the owners had locked down their gates as the firefight began, battening down their hatches.

Gray began to get an inkling of Seichan’s plan. While the public entrances were surely under armed guard, no one was likely to be watching the market’s warehouse ramps and doors. Like Seichan, the Triads knew the shops would bottle themselves up to protect their wares from looting.

So how did she expect—?

Seichan wiggled out of her sweater vest and tossed it aside. She then ripped open her silk blouse, popping buttons across the floor, exposing a black bra, revealing the flat curve of her stomach. She pulled a tail of her shirt out of her jeans and disheveled her hair.

“How do I look?” she asked.

Gray was speechless—and for once, so was Kowalski.

She rolled her eyes at them, turned, and slipped out the door. “Hang back until I get someone to unlock a security gate.”

Gray took her place at the door.

Kowalski clapped him on the shoulder. “You are one lucky bastard, Pierce.”

He wasn’t about to argue.

2:14 A.M.

Ju-long Delgado cursed his bad luck.

He stood before the plasma screen in his office, staring at the smoking hole blasted through the floor of the VIP room. He wanted to blame such misfortunes on the comet in the sky, but he was not a clinger to such superstitions. He knew the true source of his grief.

He had simply underestimated his quarry.

That would not happen twice.

A few moments ago, he had watched the larger of the two men detonate the explosive device—then he could only stand idly by as the trio made their escape, like rats down a hole.

The room’s only remaining occupant huddled in a corner.

Dr. Hwan Pak.

As he stared at the North Korean scientist, Ju-long tapped a finger on the edge of the Portuguese naval chest under the television, running various scenarios through his head, weighing each option for its best advantage.

He settled upon one course.

Earlier, Ju-long had tried to raise Tomaz at the Lisboa, to warn of their targets’ pending flight, but he had failed to reach anyone. He pictured the firefight being waged across the floors of the casino. It was a war being fought at his own behest, so he could not fault that it demanded Tomaz’s full attention at the moment.

So be it.

He pressed a button on his phone. As it was answered, he passed on a terse order. “Bring my car around.”

As he waited, someone knocked softly on his door. He turned to see it open, and a small figure slipped inside wearing a short silk robe and slippers. She was a vision in tanned skin, draped with a flow of honey-colored hair. As she crossed toward him, she cradled her swollen belly with one hand.

“Natalia, my sweet, you should be in bed.”

“Your son won’t let me,” she said with a tender smile, her eyes glancing invitingly toward him. “Perhaps if his father were lying beside me . . .”

“How I wish I could, but first I must attend to some business.”

She pouted.

He crossed to her, dropped to his knees, and kissed her belly where his son slumbered. “I’ll be back soon,” he promised them both, adding a kiss to her cheek as he ushered her out.

He truly wished he could join her—but at his father’s knee, he had learned that whether in war or business, sometimes one simply had to get one’s hands dirty.

2:16 A.M.

Seichan sensed the walls closing in on her.

The longer they remained trapped inside Casino Lisboa, the slimmer were their chances of escaping.

She drew upon that desperation as she rushed from the stairwell door and out into the open of the basement shopping mall. Feigning a slight limp, she put on a great show of distress, pretending to be one of the mall’s prostitutes caught amid the firefight.

She spun around in a circle, pulling at her hair, crying for help in Cantonese. Tears streamed down her face as she ran from one gate to another, pounding to be let inside, for someone to rescue her.