The Freedom Broker, page 30
“Three weeks later, there was an explosion on the rig. My sister tried to save some of the workers and fell off the platform, breaking almost every bone in her body. Somehow she survived.” Max turned to Christos. “She fell three hundred and ninety-three feet. This bridge is three hundred and sixty-three feet. I’m giving you a fighting chance.”
Papa grimaced. “I never knew Laila was your half sister. And you’re wrong. I had the team address her safety concerns right away. Human error caused the explosion.”
“Shut up!” Max fired the gun, a bullet penetrating Christos’s thigh.
Her father screamed, crumpling to the ground. It took everything Thea had to keep her voice even. “Please, Max. Tell me what happened.” She needed him focused on her, not on her father.
The inspector’s voice was leaden with anguish. “Laila lived for a while but with intense pain and disfigurement. She begged me to kill her.” Tears ran down his face, intermingling with the rain. His voice faltered. “I smothered her with a pillow.”
Thea exhaled. “I’m so sorry, Max.” Papa pressed his right hand to his wound while his eyes searched the platform, probably looking for a weapon. She worried he’d do or say something to set Max off again.
“And now, before your father can seal the biggest deal of his career, he’ll fall to his death.” Grief had burrowed permanently into the lines around Max’s eyes, and his words were laced with pain. His despair didn’t bode well. He was hollow inside, with nothing left to lose.
“The plane crash, the limo explosion, Helena—that was all you?” Thea asked to keep him talking.
“I wanted Christos to lose you, Rif, Helena—everyone he cared about. I needed him to experience my pain.”
Thea reeled. “What about the supertanker?”
Max shook his head. “I suspect Nikos was buying time to find Christos before you did. He and his people were on the hunt right away.”
There was no easy way out of this. Max couldn’t just walk off the bridge. He had to know he would spend the rest of his life behind bars. That was clearly not in his plans.
“Tell me about Laila.”
Max glanced at Thea. “I know what you’re doing, trying to keep me talking. We’re done.” His tone changed; his voice shook. He seemed to be spooling toward the end, and she didn’t think he intended for any of them to survive this. She couldn’t wait for Rif to take the bomb out of the equation.
She had an idea.
“If you push my father off the bridge, his suffering ends quickly.”
Max’s eyes narrowed.
She went on. “But Christos does have his kryptonite.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Me.”
Rif had sliced through the left side of the girder supporting the bomb and was halfway through the right side when Thea’s voice stopped him.
What was she thinking? “I’m almost there.” His hands steadied the torch. Sparks filled the air, the molten metal melting. “Thea, don’t do this.”
Offering herself as bait wasn’t going to stop Max from killing Christos.
Heros would simply kill them in a different order.
Chapter Seventy-Eight
Gabrielle’s hands gripped the M24. Laila’s horrific accident and injuries, Max’s agreement to end her suffering—these revelations explained the darkness in him. Her grief after her parents died was suffocating, but because she had no closure, no understanding of what had happened, she’d been obsessive in her quest for justice. If she did ever figure out who was responsible, it was possible she could be just as myopic in her desire for revenge. Maybe that was what had drawn her and Max together—the recognition of another soul in searing pain.
She spent her career assessing people, but with Max Heros her feelings had blinded her to the truth. Just her luck that she’d been attracted to a man on a full-on homicidal rampage. What Max, an officer of the law, had done in the name of payback had crossed every line imaginable. Innocent people had paid the ultimate price. And if she let him, he’d kill Christos Paris and his daughter, Thea.
Max would never relinquish his hostage. He might play with Thea, give her false hope while he used her for an audience, but he’d have his way in the end.
A raven cawed. She ignored it, entering the sniper zone. She inhaled a deep breath through the nose and held it.
The world became quiet, still.
Her eyes burned as the crosshairs settled on Max’s face. She memorized the angular line of his nose, the cleft in his chin, the lips that she’d kissed.
“I’m so sorry, Max.”
Chapter Seventy-Nine
Fog clung to the Zambian side of the gorge like a frightened child held on to a mother’s skirt. Thea stepped closer to Max and Papa, careful not to cross the trip wire.
“For fuck’s sake, stop this madness, Thea. I’ve almost cut through the girder.” Rif’s warning buzzed in her earpiece, but she ignored him. Papa was bleeding profusely, and Max was near the end of his tether. Rif was under the bridge, so he didn’t understand how quickly the situation was spiraling out of control.
“Why not destroy what Christos loves most? I’m his only daughter, someone he has pampered and protected for years.”
Come on, Max. You want to hurt me.
She raised her hands and tilted her head.
“You know too well how suffering can be worse than death. Let Christos experience what it’s like to lose everything that matters to him.”
“No.” Papa’s voice reverberated across the bridge, firm but scared. “Leave us, Thea. You have nothing to do with this.”
Max stood a little straighter. Her words and Christos’s reaction to them had triggered the logical, incisive mind of the police inspector. She’d presented an attractive alternative, a way to prolong his enemy’s pain. How could he resist? Misery demanded company. She watched him, hopeful. Come on, let me get inside your defenses. Let me close so I can disarm you.
“The bomb’s almost free . . . It might detonate on the way down.” Rif’s voice was tight, strained in her earpiece. “Don’t take this crazy risk.”
“Even better, I will just take all of us out together—that would be fitting.” Max raised his cell phone and moved his finger toward the screen.
A loud crack penetrated the air. She recognized the sound and dropped to the ground.
Pink mist collided with the rain. Max’s face was an angry red canvas after being struck in the T-zone with a high-caliber round. His head snapped back, and he stumbled, crumpling onto the cement.
She searched the horizon. Who had shot him?
“Max is down. Dump the bomb, Rif. I think he activated it.”
On the Zimbabwe side of the bridge, movement on the grassy terrain below caught her eye. Gabrielle Farrah charged toward them, a rifle slung around her shoulder.
“Shit, you’re right. It’s been activated. Ten seconds before it blows. Almost there.” The tension in Rif’s voice was unmistakable.
No way could she get to Papa and escape the bridge in time. They had to count on Rif.
“Got it!”
Thea peered over the edge of the bridge, watching the bomb as it sailed down through the air. The blast rumbled through the canyon, its concussion knocking her to the ground. The bridge shuddered as the bomb exploded, the blast traveling in all directions in a sphere of debris and concussive waves. Her ears buzzed, and her eyes burned.
Papa clung to the guardrail on the platform.
“Rif, you okay?”
Nothing.
“Rif! Talk to me.”
He didn’t respond.
Then she heard a cough in her earpiece. Another one. “Dammit.” Cough. “Remind me not to climb any more bridges.”
Thank God.
The high-pitched whine of a small engine caught her attention. What the hell? She rubbed her face, then climbed to her knees.
Out of the fog hovering inside the gorge, a motorcycle bulleted toward them from the Zambian side, snaking around the truck blocking the bulk of the bridge.
As it closed the distance, she recognized a familiar silhouette. Nikos.
Chapter Eighty
Thea’s mind reeled. Time slowed, like in those horrific nightmares where you’re desperate to get somewhere but feel as if you’re running through sludge. She staggered toward Papa, knowing this was no dream.
She couldn’t match the motorcycle’s superior speed. Nikos beat her to the platform, hopping off the bike before it came to a full stop. Sparks flared from the pavement and metal groaned as the motorbike slid across the harsh concrete.
He grabbed their father by the back of the neck, forcing him to stand on the very edge of the platform. Raindrops streaked Nikos’s face, looking like tears, but his expression was flat.
Thea closed the distance, her pulse thundering in her throat. Together they stood on the precipice, the three surviving members of the Paris family, a blood war boiling over after twenty long years.
Nikos looked down at Max’s corpse. “He let emotion get the better of him.”
“Don’t make the same mistake.” Papa tried to writhe away from Nikos. “This is between you and me. Leave your sister out of it.”
Younger, stronger, her brother overpowered Papa. “Thea has a decision to make. She finally knows the truth, how your greed led to my kidnapping.”
Hope warred with terror in Thea’s gut. “I want to hear your story, do anything I can to help. I love you, Nikos.” Maybe she could find a way to stop him.
“More than you love him?” Her brother’s eyes brimmed with pain.
“I’m the one who let you down.” Her words were honest, raw. “If I’d been able to scream for help that night, you’d never have been taken. I’m so sorry.”
“That’s not the point. If you had been the one kidnapped, your life would’ve been destroyed, and all because of our father’s greed.”
“That night will haunt me forever. I know I can never make it up to you, but I’ve tried every day since.”
“I never wanted your pity, Thea. I wanted love and acceptance from my sister and father. You gave me that. He didn’t.”
Papa’s voice held remorse. “I did everything I could for you, son, but—”
“You considered me damaged goods from the moment you read my story. And we wouldn’t want to sully the great Paris name, would we?”
“You’re wrong, Nikos. I did what I could to protect you.”
“And that’s why you sent me to the loony bin. Then away to that school for troubled kids. Because you loved me so much.”
Papa looked as if he was at war with himself. “You needed help.”
“Help from strangers wasn’t what I needed. I wanted my family to stand by me.”
Papa’s eyes bulged. “It wasn’t safe to have you with us. For Christ’s sake, Nikos, I covered up a murder for you.”
Thea felt sucker-punched. “Murder? What murder?”
Nikos glanced at her. “Our nanny. She was a bully.”
All the air left her lungs. Allison had been a stern, unforgiving taskmaster, not popular with her or her brother, but she’d never hurt them. The woman’s sudden disappearance made a sick sense now.
“When I left Oba’s camp, I had a mission in life: to restore balance in the world by destroying bullies.”
“There are many ways to make the world a better place, but killing people is never the answer.” Papa spoke slowly, as if to a child.
“Justice is a hard game. Playing by the rules doesn’t work. Ares made a difference.”
Ares? So he justified being an arms dealer as a way to fight bullying? It was as if he was still twelve and just back from his abduction. He was the hero in his own story, but his quest was twisted.
Christos’s face reddened. “You’re no Robin Hood, just a common criminal.”
Nikos laughed, a short bark devoid of humor. “You’re the epitome of greed and a bully. That’s why I won’t let you have Kanzi.”
Christos snaked his hand into a coiled pile of cords and harnesses. “Too late. Kanzi is already in my pocket. Prime Minister Kimweri and I made a deal weeks ago. The negotiations were only for show.”
Papa had faked his own kidnapping, but not because he was afraid of Nikos. He’d wanted to beat Nikos at his own demented game.
With all her insight and ability to read others, Thea had been blinded to the true character of the two people closest to her. She understood Nikos’s damage. He’d been through hell and couldn’t find his way back. Her father didn’t have that excuse.
She needed to force her roiling emotions aside and de-escalate the situation. “We’re family. We have to find a way to work this out.”
Nikos’s voice trembled with emotion. “Time to choose, Thea. Him or me.”
The frustrated boy who’d felt abandoned by his father, the child soldier who’d had to murder innocents, the arms dealer who sold weapons to foment rebellion—could she appeal to the brother she loved, the one who’d always protected her?
“Who’s the bully now, Nikos?”
But her brother was beyond that kind of self-reflection.
“Good-bye, Papa,” he said. He shoved their father closer to the edge, but Christos dropped to his knees, spreading himself on the platform so it would be difficult to push him off. One hand grabbed the side railing; the other clutched one of the bungee cords.
Nikos kicked him hard in the side, then forced his legs off the edge. Christos lost his grip on the railing and grappled for the platform but couldn’t quite reach it. He pulled the cord he’d grabbed with him as his body weight worked against him, dragging him over the side.
Thea dove forward, but her hands grasped air. Christos tumbled toward the Zambezi River, the bungee cord wrapped around his arm, the slack snaking off the platform after him.
While her brother leaned over the railing to watch, Thea shimmied backward, snatching a harness, securing it to her hips. Her gaze met Nikos’s for a fraction of a second, a lifetime of memories passing between them as he saw the choice in her eyes.
“He’s not worth it.” Her brother lunged toward her.
Twisting away from him, she dove off the platform’s open ledge into free fall. Inverted, she sliced downward, the air barreling past her ears, obliterating all other sounds. The wind whipped her hair as the river rushed toward her. Falling, falling, she scanned the water for Papa, but she couldn’t find any sign of him in the deep, rushing river below.
The bungee cord reached its full extension. A strong jerk grabbed her hips and legs, and she bounced upward, weightless. Blood rushed to her head, leaving her disoriented. After a long moment, she fell toward the water again, then another sharp tug pulled her up. Up and down, up and down. People enjoyed this?
The yo-yoing slowed, and she swung at the end of her tether, studying the waters thirty feet below, searching for Papa. Finally, movement in the river caught her eye. Her father had survived the fall and was clinging to a rock. His head disappeared underwater and resurfaced again, bobbing like a cork as the rushing waters of the Zambezi tried to sweep him away.
Thea jackknifed her body, clutching the bungee cord with her left hand. She reached for her boot knife so she could cut herself free. Before she could remove the knife, something slammed into her right shoulder blade. Pain reverberated down her spine, and she lost her grip on the cord, spinning around and around upside down, like a top.
Dazed, dangling, she spotted Nikos bouncing beside her on another bungee cord. “You need to stop living Papa’s lie,” he shouted as he smashed into her again, his left hand grabbing a large clump of her hair. She turned her body sideways and crooked her right leg, uncoiling a vicious kick to his chest. A loud grunt. Sharp, stinging pain flared in her scalp as he swung away, taking a handful of hair with him.
He came for her again but swung past without contact. She scrambled for her knife. Her hand connected with her boot, but she couldn’t lift her pant leg fast enough.
In the meantime, Nikos had encircled her so that their cords were now intertwined.
She rotated in the opposite direction to unlink the twisted ropes, but Nikos’s fist hammered her jaw. She tasted blood. He spun around her again. The knife. She needed it now. In close quarters, he would overpower her.
Nikos swung toward her, but she arched out of the way, yanking up her pant cuff. His foot connected with her lower back. Pain shot deep into her left kidney; white spots blurred her vision. Their faces were inches apart. His lips curled in rage. “How dare you choose Papa over me?”
All these years, she’d never seen this Nikos. Love and guilt had blinded her.
His breath was hot against her cheek. The pungent stench of gasoline flooded her nose. She flashed on the General, his necklacing. She understood now—all this was payback.
She tried to twist away, but his hands closed around her neck, crushing her windpipe as they swung back and forth, awkwardly spinning above the river. She chopped at his arms, but his grip was impenetrable.
Can’t breathe. Darkness descended. She curled her leg underneath her, her fingers connecting with the blade’s handle. She pulled it out and sawed desperately at her cord.
Nikos drew her face to his, his hands still wrapped around her throat. “You were supposed to choose me. Not him. You were supposed to love me.”
“I do love you,” she gasped.
Snap.
Her full weight ripped her out of his hands and sent her hurtling toward the river.
The impact of the water hammered into her like a truck, and she plunged down, the cold river swallowing her. She clung to the knife as her body tumbled in the vicious currents.
The sound of roaring water hit her ears when she broke the surface. A deep gasp, and she coughed repeatedly. Her throat burned. Her lungs heaved, greedy for air. She looked right, left, trying to orient herself. Nikos was still in the sky, hanging from his cord. She scanned the water for her father.
Papa lay face up in a slower-moving eddy created by a collection of rocks near the shore. His left hand clung to an outcropping, but the swirling water could suck him down the rapids any second now.
