King Solomon's Curse

  ‘Macy, stay still!’ he shouted up to the tower’s top. ‘I’m coming to get you!’

  ‘How?’ Nina demanded.

  ‘By thinking outside the box – literally! Come on.’ He hobbled as quickly as he could back across the chamber to the dummy he had tackled. ‘Grab its gun.’

  She picked up the AK-74 and followed him to the perimeter wall. Spots of light marked where the toppling guard’s fire had punched through it. Eddie poked a finger into one hole. ‘It’s just plasterboard.’

  ‘How does that help us get to Macy?’

  ‘This whole thing’s like a movie set – and movie sets need lots of lights.’ He pointed up at the even blue-grey glow of the fake sky. ‘They also need to be able to get to ’em to change the bulbs . . .’ He signalled for her to back away. ‘Okay, cover your ears.’

  Nina hurriedly brought up her hands as Eddie raised his rifle – and emptied the magazine into the wall.

  The wooden panelling shredded as bullets tore into it. He swept the gun upwards, carving a ragged line of holes. The AK ran out of ammo; he tossed it away and took the other weapon from Nina, another sustained burst tearing through the drywall before he released the trigger and backed up. ‘Okay, coming through!’

  Eddie hurled himself at the wall – and smashed through, the bullet-perforated section tearing free to leave an almost cartoonish hole. He stumbled to a halt on the other side, raising the rifle.

  He had emerged between the test area’s outer boundary and the Funhouse’s corrugated metal exterior wall. Dismantled sections of what he guessed were set pieces for other scenarios stood in large racks, crates and containers holding props. There was still no sign of Brice . . . and he was getting the feeling that the spy was not as close by as he had thought.

  One of the snow machines was mounted on a scaffold nearby, large blocks of ice slowly being fed into it from a refrigerated hopper. But it was what stood beyond – and above – that caught his attention. The lighting grid did indeed resemble that of a movie soundstage, a complex latticework supporting thousands of LED clusters that could be set to any colour and brightness to simulate different conditions. A ladder ran up one of the supports to a narrow catwalk heading out over the enclosed set . . .

  Nina came through the hole. ‘Okay, how do we get to Macy? We’ve got to reach her before Brice comes back.’

  ‘I don’t think he is coming back,’ Eddie said, limping to the ladder. ‘We almost get blown up, and he doesn’t even bother to gloat? He’s not watching any more.’

  ‘Then what’s he doing?’

  ‘I dunno. But he must have had a reason for bringing us here, and I don’t think it was about revenge. If we get killed, that’s just a bonus. He wants something else.’ He started to climb the ladder, grimacing each time his wounded leg took his weight.

  ‘But what’s here that he wants? He killed the staff, so he could have taken anything that was already here—’ A gasp as she realised Brice’s objective had come with them; had brought them. ‘Peter! Oh my God, he’s after Peter! That’s why he said he’d contact us through him – because he knew he was the person most likely to help us!’

  ‘Christ, yeah. Alderley’s an MI6 agent, and they always have an escape plan – so Brice probably wants to use his!’ Eddie dropped the Kalashnikov to her. ‘There’s a couple of rounds left. I’ll get Macy – you warn Alderley!’

  He resumed his ascent, pace quickening despite the pain. A green sign on the wall pointed towards an emergency exit, but not knowing how far away it was or where it emerged, Nina hurried in the opposite direction to the main entrance.

  Outside, Alderley was still in the car, watching the double doors with rising concern and frustration. The bursts of gunfire from within had been followed by an explosion, and a few minutes had now passed since the last exchange of fire.

  He knew he had agreed to let Chase and Nina rescue their daughter, but he couldn’t allow Brice to escape. A moment of internal debate, then he took out his phone to call in backup—

  The front passenger door opened.

  Alderley looked around sharply – and saw a Glock pointed at him.

  Brice was behind it, hunched down. ‘Evening, Peter.’ The spy had crept around the building from the emergency exit at its rear, keeping low to use the lie of the land and the bushes surrounding the car park to conceal himself from any distant observers.

  ‘John!’ Alderley replied. ‘Where are Chase and Nina? What have you done with their little girl?’

  ‘They were alive the last time I checked, but it has gone rather quiet, hasn’t it?’ He had a tablet computer in his other hand, which he placed on the passenger seat. ‘Let’s have a look, though. I want to make sure they’re occupied while we do our business.’

  ‘What business?’ Alderley snapped as Brice activated the tablet. ‘If you think I’m going to help you—’

  ‘You are going to help me, Peter, because I know you’d rather be alive than dead. Poor grieving Poppy would struggle to get by on the parsimonious SIS spousal death benefit, wouldn’t she?’ A grid of surveillance camera feeds from inside the Funhouse appeared on the screen. ‘Now, where are you, Chase?’

  He tapped on one image, which expanded to fill the screen. Alderley felt a surge of fear at the sight of Macy, tied to a chair – and surrounded by armed animatronic dummies in Russian uniforms. There was no sound, but he could tell the young girl was in tears and extremely distressed. ‘You absolute shit,’ he snarled. ‘You’d use a child as a hostage?’

  ‘That’s why you never made it to the top tier of fieldwork, Peter,’ Brice replied as he dismissed the image and checked other cameras. ‘You never had the balls to do whatever was necessary. You’re just like Quentin Hove and all the other politicians – happy to give the orders, but too afraid of getting any dirt on your plump little hands.’

  The older man noticed a frown forming on Brice’s face. ‘My hands are not “plump”,’ he said with exaggerated indignation, wanting to distract his captor for as long as possible. If Brice couldn’t find Eddie and Nina, then maybe they were outside the test area . . . ‘And what do you want from me?’

  ‘What I want,’ said Brice, still flicking between the feeds, ‘is for you to arrange an NQA flight out of the country from Southampton. I know the airspace is closed and all civilian flights are grounded, but your getting here so quickly tells me you’ve got the authority to circumvent that.’

  ‘I don’t think that my turning up at the airport with the most wanted man in Britain will qualify as “No Questions Asked”.’

  ‘Well, that’s just it, Peter. I don’t need you to think; I need you to do.’ The frown deepened. ‘Where are they?’

  Eddie sidestepped carefully along the precarious catwalk and looked down through a narrow gap between the scrims. He was almost above the control tower. Once he jumped on to its roof, he should be able to lift one of its corrugated panels and reach Macy.

  The last few steps. His wounded calf muscle felt as if someone was slowly driving a corkscrew ever deeper into his flesh, but he took a long breath, willing away the pain as he reached the centre of the tower’s roof . . . then dropped.

  The gauze beneath the lights tore loose as he fell. He hit the roof with a bang—

  And kept falling.

  The thin metal folded like cardboard under his weight. Eddie plunged through into the control room with a yelp – and landed heavily on one of the dummies, flattening it.

  Macy looked around in astonishment. ‘Daddy!’

  ‘Macy, duck!’ he yelled as he rolled painfully off the broken figure. There were three other plastic Russians surrounding her – and now they were all turning his way—

  ‘There you are!’ crowed Brice as one feed suddenly revealed a flurry of movement. He tapped it to zoom in, then another touch of the screen gave him control over the sentries. His target scrambled to
his feet as the dummies pivoted towards him, guns at the ready—

  Eddie grabbed the fallen dummy’s rifle, but couldn’t risk firing so close to Macy. Instead he swung the weapon above her head, smacking the AK out of the closest soldier’s hands before whirling to take an entire arm off another.

  But there was still one left—

  He dived forward – wrapping his arms around his daughter and bowling the chair over as the dummy fired.

  Macy screamed as they hit the floor, bullets whipping above them. Eddie released her and rolled at the dummy’s legs. It lurched, but was attached to a weighted base and sprang back upright, still shooting. The control room’s windows shattered.

  The rifle jerked mechanically downwards as it tracked the Yorkshireman—

  But the soldier’s arms had reached the limit of their movement. Eddie jumped up and snatched the AK from the unliving hands – then punched the dummy’s head clean off its shoulders. ‘Up yours, Charlie Crippen!’

  ‘Daddy!’ Macy wailed. He dropped the gun and untied the rope, then hugged her. ‘Daddy, you’re here, Daddy!’

  ‘Course I’m here, love,’ he replied, experiencing a wave of relief so strong that it felt as if his heart would burst from his chest. ‘I’ll always come back for you, always.’ Macy buried her face into his cheek.

  But he knew the day was far from over. He still had to find Nina and Alderley – and deal with Brice. ‘Come on, Macy,’ he said. ‘Sorry I forgot to bring you a toy lion; we’ll go and find one with Mummy.’

  ‘Mommy,’ his daughter automatically corrected. Eddie grinned, then started down the damaged stairs.

  ‘How sweet,’ Brice said sarcastically, as the tablet showed father and daughter descending from the control room.

  Alderley, engaged in a phone call, glanced at the screen. ‘They’re okay? Good,’ he muttered in an aside.

  The ex-spy suppressed his annoyance. Killing Chase, after all, was not the reason he had come to the Funhouse; getting Alderley away from the safety of SIS headquarters had been his true objective. With a gun trained upon him through the open passenger door, the section head had been forced to make arrangements via back-door channels – any officer worth his salt knew ways to bypass the agency’s bureaucracy – for a light aircraft flight from Southampton across the English Channel to France. A parachute jump into Normandy, where he had contacts who would either be willing or be given no choice but to help, and Brice would be gone, with the whole of Europe and beyond into which to disappear.

  The irony that the one place he could never again go was his home country didn’t escape him. Now that he had been exposed, Britain’s ruling elite – even though they would benefit the most from his actions – could not be seen to grant him the slightest leniency. But it was a price he was willing to pay for saving the nation.

  Besides, even he had to admit that while England had many charms, its weather was not one of them. Heading south had its advantages . . .

  ‘Okay, the plane’ll be ready in forty minutes,’ said the man Alderley had called. Brice had insisted the conversation take place on speaker so he could be sure a trap was not being set. There was still the possibility that Alderley had used a duress code, but the field agent was gambling that he wasn’t nearly paranoid enough to have prepared one for every eventuality. ‘The parachute’ll be on board.’

  ‘Great, thanks,’ Alderley replied. Brice gestured for him to disconnect. ‘All right, John, now what?’

  ‘Now, you call off the surveillance teams. Tell them I’d already left before they got here – the whole thing was a diversion.’

  ‘They won’t believe it.’

  The gun’s muzzle tilted towards his head. ‘I’ve got seventeen reasons for you to be very convincing. Now make the call—’

  ‘Drop it or I shoot!’

  Brice looked up to see Nina – holding an AK-74. Even with her left arm in a sling, the rifle was aimed unwaveringly at him. ‘Nina!’ cried Alderley in relief. ‘You’re okay!’

  ‘Yeah, no thanks to this asshole. Brice, I said drop the gun. Now.’ Brice let the gun clatter to the ground. ‘Now move back.’ He slowly retreated, watching her intently. ‘Peter, are you okay?’

  ‘Yeah – and Eddie and Macy are fine,’ Alderley told her as she rounded the car and kicked the pistol under it. ‘He just rescued her.’

  ‘Oh, thank God.’ Her gaze momentarily flicked towards the doors, hoping to see her family—

  The flat crack of a gunshot and a searing pain in her upper chest came as one.

  Nina fell against the car. Agony overpowered any thought of retaliation as she clutched at the burning wound torn from the side of her left breast to beneath her armpit. Brice had shot her – but how?

  The answer came as he snatched up her rifle. She glimpsed smoke trailing from his right shirt cuff. Some kind of trick weapon, an ace hidden literally up his sleeve . . .

  ‘It was in the armoury here,’ Brice said smugly, tugging back his cuff to reveal a dull grey tube strapped to the inside of his wrist. ‘Single shot, triggered by muscle action. James Bond may not be real, but SIS still has its own little gadgets.’ He brought the AK towards Nina and Alderley, his face turning cold. ‘Now. Peter, make the call. Or she dies.’

  ‘Don’t do it, Peter,’ Nina gasped. Each breath felt like a glowing poker pressing against her chest. ‘He’s going to kill us anyway.’

  Alderley glared defiantly at his former comrade. ‘I know. Go to hell, John.’

  ‘Very well. Goodbye, Nina.’ A smile of cold triumph curled Brice’s lips as the rifle pointed straight at her face—

  ‘Brice!’

  The shout came from the building’s rear corner, a hundred and fifty feet away. The surprised MI6 man glanced towards it – then looked back at Nina as his finger tightened on the trigger—

  The split-second’s hesitation saved her life.

  Another gunshot – and Brice’s throat exploded in a gory burst of blood and torn meat.

  He spun and fell, the Kalashnikov’s last bullets clanging into the car’s flank as his finger spasmed on the trigger. Nina scrambled clear as he hit the ground.

  ‘Nina! Nina!’ shouted Alderley, rushing to help her. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes – I mean no, I just got frickin’ shot!’

  He kicked the rifle away and checked her wound. ‘You were lucky. Those last-resort jobs are pretty low powered and inaccurate.’ A brief look at Brice. He was still alive, squirming as he clutched his mangled throat. ‘That wasn’t, though.’

  ‘Sometimes it is all about being a good shot,’ said a familiar voice. Nina looked up – and saw Eddie jogging clumsily towards her, Alderley’s pistol in his hand. ‘Was aiming a couple of inches higher, but from that range, it’ll do.’

  ‘Eddie!’ she cried. Alderley helped her up. ‘Where’s Macy?’

  ‘Back there.’ He flicked a thumb over one shoulder to where their daughter was peering fearfully around the corner. ‘She’s okay, thank God.’ The Yorkshireman reached Brice. ‘Sore throat, Brice? Need some Lockets?’ The other man opened his mouth as if to snarl a retort, but all that came out was a slurry of saliva-frothed blood.

  Alderley made a hurried phone call. ‘We’ve got Brice. I repeat, we have Brice. Move in and secure the area. He’s been shot in the throat; he’ll need urgent medical attention.’ He turned to the downed man. ‘Got to patch you up for your treason trial, after all.’

  ‘Mustn’t cheat the hangman,’ Eddie added.

  Alderley gave him a knowing look. ‘Richard Burton?’

  He nodded. ‘Where Eagles Dare.’

  ‘Great film. One of my favourites.’

  ‘You know, maybe you’re not so bad after all, Alderley.’ Both men smiled.

  ‘All right, enough with the male bonding,’ said Nina. ‘And I don’t want Macy to see that.’ She nodded
distastefully at Brice’s ruined neck.

  ‘I’ll watch him,’ Alderley offered, recovering Brice’s gun. ‘You go and get your little girl.’

  The couple thanked him and made their way to Macy. She regarded them both with tearful concern. ‘Mommy! Are you okay? You’ve got blood on you!’

  Nina had done her best to cover the wound, but both her hand and the clothing beneath were smeared with crimson. ‘I’m fine, honey. Don’t worry about me, it’s you who’s important. Are you hurt?’

  She shook her head. ‘No . . . but I want to go home.’

  ‘We will, soon as we can,’ Eddie assured her. He picked her up and hugged her, Nina nuzzling against them both as cars sped towards the building.

  Epilogue

  The Shetland Islands, Scotland

  Two months later

  Even in summer, the Shetlands were far from warm. Eddie zipped up his leather jacket against the wind as he stepped from the helicopter. Mossy moorland greeted him, the sky and sea beyond a melancholy slate grey. ‘Don’t think I’ll be working on my tan,’ he said.

  ‘It’s not one of Scotland’s top tourist spots, no,’ Peter Alderley agreed. The rocky isles were over a hundred miles north of the Scottish mainland, most of the bleak archipelago uninhabited.

  Which was why they were there. There were no trees on this particular island, the only thing rising above the rugged terrain a squat blockhouse of storm-scoured concrete. It was an old military facility, a relic of the Second World War when the Shetlands had been home to several Royal Air Force bases.

  It had also housed facilities of the Special Operations Executive, the wartime military equivalent of MI6. Ironically, this former SOE bunker now contained a secret of its present-day counterpart. Alderley led the way down to a thick metal door, presenting his ID card to a camera. A brief wait, then a buzzer sounded and the barrier grumbled aside.

  The two men entered to be greeted by a pair of uniformed guards. Identities were checked again, scanners passed over their bodies to ensure nothing was being smuggled inside, then one guard signalled to another man in a control booth. A second harsh buzz, and an inner door opened. The visitors were escorted through.