Chris Ryan [Extreme Hard Ta Redeemer (epub)

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.He was early twenties, a golden dollar-sign chain hanging from his neck, and a hole in his chest large enough to sink an orange.Weiss squatted down beside him.‘If you want, I can make it quick,’ he said, reaching a hand into his duster.‘Tell me which way he went.’The kid shuddered.It was a bitch of a choice for any human being to make: die now, or live longer and suffer.The kid chose death.He pointed a finger west.‘Was he alone?’ asked Weiss, now feeling for the syringe.The kid curled his thumb and index finger into a ball, leaving two fingers in the air.So, the target had company.He had all the information he needed.Time to honour his end of the bargain.Weiss frowned.He couldn’t find what he was looking for.Pulling his coat wide open, he ran his peepers down the row of needles.He was missing a syringe, one loaded with a toxic alkaloid called aconitine.That’s too bad, he said to himself.You probably dropped it when you escaped from Rolex and Lakers.Aconitine was one of his favourite compounds, and he made a mental note to touch base with his chemist on his return to Ciudad Juárez.The kid wanted a quick death, and Weiss obliged.He administered a high dosage of succinylcholine to the neck.Within seconds the kid’s muscles shrivelled up and he couldn’t breathe.Something flopped in his chest.He went over to the dark side.Weiss moved on.He got about halfway across the clearing before he doubled over in agony and his guts contracted, as if someone was yanking at him with a bungee cord.He coughed up black goo; shivered in spite of the jungle heat.The tips of his toes were numb, his fingers likewise.You’ve got a fever, he reasoned.After what Roulette and his goons did to you earlier, are you surprised? But don’t let it stop you.I won’t, but Christ, it hurts.He steadied himself, fearing he’d faint.One glance west and he was on his feet.He noticed the snapped branches and the crushed twigs.The footprints and the damaged undergrowth.Someone had beaten a path through the foliage and left evidence of their route.It was God’s will, he was sure of it.Thirty million dollars.So close now, he could almost smell the greenbacks.Weiss ignored the fever and pushed on.171701 hours.John Bald looked at Gardner briefly, then went back to carving firewood from the wet bark.Crunching twigs sounded to his six o’clock.Hands drew near to him, and Bald put the bark to one side, knife dangling between his legs.‘Took your time, man,’ Bald said.Thinking the question was directed at him, Gardner made to answer.But Hands replied, ‘We got held up.Messengers had a little welcome party for us, yeah? Nothing to get your knickers in a twist about.Me and Jason Statham here gave them what for.’Bald ran his tongue around his mouth.‘Sure no one followed you?’‘Gimme a break,’ Hands replied.‘Those gang pricks couldn’t follow their own fucking shadows.’Bald gave no indication of whether he agreed with Hands.Holding it up to the light, he examined the Fairbairn-Sykes.‘Well, you got here just in time.I think our mutual friend is about to pass out from the pain.I need you to clean his wound and get some fresh dressing on it.And a shot of morphine too, keep him quiet.’Hands strode past Gardner to a figure at his peripheral vision.He noticed the foot first.The boot had been cut off, a grey blanket tied around it and a long forked branch that stretched from his armpit to below his foot, tied with vines around the ankle.The foot belonged to Falcon.Gardner did a double-take.Couldn’t believe what he was seeing.He looked back towards Bald, who made no effort to explain anything to him, much less make eye contact.He seemed obsessed by the fighting knife.‘What, what’s going—?’‘You must be exhausted, man.Here,’ Bald said, tossing a canteen towards Gardner.‘It’s from the stream.It’s got a wee kick to it from the purification tablets.’This isn’t the John I know, Gardner thought.Bald never used two words when one would do the trick.But he was also warm and loyal.Now it seemed he was treating Gardner like a stranger.No ‘thank you’ for travelling halfway around the world.Gardner unscrewed the cap on the canteen.Dark, filmy water sloshed about inside.He didn’t raise it to his lips.Instead, he looked at the stuffed Bergens beside Bald – calm, relaxed Bald – and wondered.He laughed.‘Something funny, Joe?’‘You tell me,’ Gardner replied.‘The tablets, the fake camp, the Bergens.You don’t mean to tell me you had all this kit with you for a patrol with BOPE.This took planning.Preparation.When you got jumped, all this shit was already in place.’‘Aye, man.You’ve a fair point,’ Bald answered, his bottom lip weighing it up.‘The truth of the matter is, we had to take some precautions.’‘Who the fuck’s “we”?’Bald extended an arm towards Hands and Falcon.Hands rinsed out Falcon’s wound with water, wiping it down with a gauze swab and wrapping a roll of sterile dressing around the open wound.The BOPE captain was feverish, fucking out of it like a pillhead in a rave club.‘Why, my business partners, of course.’Gardner lit up like an oil field.He felt duped, had the urge to punch someone in revenge, but he wasn’t sure who deserved a socking the most: Bald for his cry of help, Falcon for keeping shtum about his link to John, or Hands just for being, well, fucking Dave Hands.‘You reached out to me,’ he said, pointing to Bald.‘You said you were in the shit, John.Knee-deep in the stuff.That’s why I rushed out here at a fucking moment’s notice.Because you were in trouble.’Bald slipped on his dried socks and boots.‘But I am, Joe.I am.That’s why I asked you here.Listen, I’ll answer all your questions in a minute.First, I’ve got a question for you.’He stabbed the Fairbairn-Sykes into the felled tree.‘Can you still drive a boat?’181720 hours.Gardner didn’t reply.He noticed Hands and Falcon edging towards Bald, hanging at his four o’clock.His brain tried to make sense of everything.The connection with dodgy Dave Hands.The need for a boat.The fake camp.Falcon’s unease about his BOPE comrades.Each question only led to more questions.‘This is important,’ Bald continued.‘Life or death.I need to know if you can help me.’‘Help with what?’‘Getting out, man.The airport’s a no-go, there’s checkpoints at the state borders, and it’s a long haul to Santos by road anyway.Boat’s the only option we have.’‘You’re gonna have to be straight with me here, John.Either you’ve lost your passport, or there’s something a lot darker that you’re not telling me.I’ve come a long way – too far to be fucked about.So how about you cut to the chase?’Bald chuckled and wagged a finger at Gardner.‘That’s what I always liked about you, Joe.You call a spade a spade.’He nodded to Hands.The skinny ex-Blade paced towards the Bergens and fiddled with the straps on the leftmost one, while Bald took from his pocket a tennis-ball-sized fruit, reddish and leathery, sliced it down the centre with his knife and popped one half into his mouth.Then Hands tipped out the contents of the Bergen.‘This,’ Bald said, ‘is your spade [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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