Chapter 16 #2
Relieved he hadn’t insisted that she stay put and wait for the more junior investigators, Hallie nodded.
She headed out the plain door into the chill mid-morning air and drew a much-needed deep breath.
She’d been right. The door did lead to the back of the building, a narrow road which had a few commercial waste bins on the shop side.
On the other side of the road was a plain, high stone wall that probably bordered the gardens of the few large houses in this area.
She heard Girard lock the door behind her.
A sensible precaution. Neither of them wanted anyone else stumbling onto Zurine’s secret before they’d had a chance to study things further.
With her body tense, feet itching to get going, Hallie set off alongside the high wall, following it to the end and then turning the corner.
Even if she went out of sight, she knew Girard would be able to find her with his tracking magic.
And moving was helping. Even the few strides along the wall to the end had calmed her, settled her.
She started trying to focus on the things around her to take her out of her own head.
Thinking in circles wasn’t going to help.
Walking in circles and paying attention to her surroundings might.
She caught the faint scent of some kind of winter-flowering plant, almost certainly from just over one of the high stone walls, and the faint murmur of what sounded like running water.
The gardens here might have water features.
She noticed that the walls were all well-maintained, free of weeds and odd gaps.
The ground under her was plain tarmac, in contrast to the cobblestones in the main street.
Whoever was in charge of the maintenance of this area must like the look of cobblestones, even though tarmac was far more pleasant to drive and walk on.
She got to the end of the block and paused, wondering where to go next.
By chance, she’d stopped in the shadow of the building, and so had a very clear view across the street to a large, dark, panelled van that was pulling to a halt and the black-clad person in the driver’s seat.
She pressed back against the wall, heart thudding.
She’d last seen that sort of outfit in Minamaan when she and Girard and Frollo’s team had been attacked.
Not giving herself time to think, she turned and ran back along the length of the building, finding that the storeroom door was still open.
She burst inside, remembering to pause and bar it shut behind her, and then ran into the shop front, where Girard was standing at the cash register, frowning at his phone screen.
He looked up when she came in and started a welcoming smile.
“That was quick, I thought -” He broke off, putting his phone away. “What’s wrong?”
“More attackers on the way,” Hallie said, a little out of breath. “Dark van. Other side of the street. Look.”
Girard took a look and muttered a curse. “Let’s head upstairs. Best defensive position,” he added, following her as she turned and headed back into the stockroom.
She sprinted up the stairs, remembering to skip over the tripwire and followed him into Zurine’s apartment. Girard was on his phone as the two of them made it into the entryway.
“Sir, we’ve got trouble here. Requesting backup.”
There was a brief pause, then Girard went on.
“Unknown number of hostiles but wearing the same gear as those we encountered in Minamaan, so assuming similarly well-armed.”
Another pause. Hallie could hear that it was Peredur on the other side of the call, although she couldn’t make out his words.
“We both have handguns and a couple of extra magazines each. I’ve got body armour. We’re upstairs in the forger’s apartment.”
Another pause.
“Yes, I think the equipment is secure. The doors are back in place and locked.” Girard was tense, eyes briefly meeting Hallie’s as they stood next to the wall. “Understood.”
Girard ended the call, made some adjustment to his phone, then set the camera against the peephole in the door, extending his arm so he was to one side of the door, with Hallie, but they could both see what was on the screen.
Just then it was a rather boring view of the stairs leading up to the apartment.
“Clever,” Hallie approved. “Backup on the way?”
“As soon as they can, yes, but we need to hold out until then. Peredur is going to warn Jasper and Dudon,” Girard added, perhaps anticipating Hallie’s next question, or perhaps he had also been worried about the young men.
“I didn’t see how many were in the van,” Hallie said, annoyed with herself. “I just came back to warn you.”
“That seems like the right move. If they’d seen you, they probably would have fired,” Girard said.
“We’re assuming they’re from the same group as in Minamaan?” Hallie asked, more to cover her own nervousness than because she needed an answer. She was holding her gun in both hands, palms damp with sweat.
“Here they come,” Girard said.
Hallie’s eyes snapped to the screen, and she saw movement. Four. No, five. Black-clad figures armed with a mix of handguns and larger weapons, filing through the stockroom. They spotted the stairs and started making their way up. Here they come, indeed.
The black-clad attackers were not as careful as Girard and Hallie had been on the stairs.
As the lead person was almost at the top, close enough that Hallie could see they were dressed in identical gear to the ones in Minamaan, there was a blinding flash followed by a loud bang.
The floor under her feet shook and the view through the camera lens dissolved into smoke and chaos.
Girard pulled the phone back and shoved it into a pocket, taking hold of his gun with both hands, face tight as he waved for Hallie to get behind him.
He was the one with the body armour, Hallie reminded herself. And if she tucked in behind him, it might give them a small advantage of surprise.
Girard had positioned them behind the door so that when it opened, admitting smoke and cursing and a pair of limping, black-clad, would-be attackers, the newcomers didn’t see Girard or Hallie at first. Girard shoved the door closed on whoever might have come into the space next, and fired into the newcomers.
His bullets hit the centre mass of the first person who’d come through the door, sending them tumbling to the ground even as the second person stumbled, turning, raising their weapon.
Hallie and Girard fired together. One or more bullets hit the person in the leg and they cried out, falling to the ground, gun thudding onto the carpet.
“Cuffs,” Girard said, handing a pair to Hallie. “We’ll bind them together and leave them behind the door. It’ll slow the others down.”
Hallie didn’t say anything, holstering her gun as she followed Girard’s lead.
It felt somewhat callous to be using the still-breathing attackers as doorstops, but she also knew that they would have killed both her and Girard without hesitation.
Binding the attackers back to back, she and Girard stripped out all the weapons they could find on a brief search, then pulled off the knitted head coverings.
Both men had similar colouring to the ones from Minamaan, with pale skin, blond hair and blue eyes.
Both attackers were conscious and not happy with their circumstances.
Girard took photos of the furious faces while Hallie carried the haul of weapons into Zurine’s apartment and dumped them onto the gigantic desk.
Girard followed her and shut the door to the entryway closed behind them, dragging the chair from the desk across to wedge it behind the door.
“It won’t hold them for long, but will give us a little more time,” he said.
He was worried. Hallie couldn’t blame him. There were at least three more black-clad attackers in the building who now knew exactly where Hallie and Girard were.
“We could start a war with this many weapons,” she commented, trying to distract herself from her own racing pulse. There was one automatic rifle, a powerful handgun, a pair of smaller handguns and several knives.
“Start one, but not win it,” Girard commented, picking up the rifle.
“Get behind the desk. It’s solid enough to provide some protection.
” He sounded not only worried but angry at something.
Hallie tucked herself into the corner between the desk and the wall, gun held ready, and spared him a glance.
There was a deep line between his brows and a tightness to his mouth. Not pain, she thought. Something else.
“What’s wrong?” Hallie asked.
“They turned up really fast after we got here,” Girard said, his eyes on the door to the entryway.
Hallie opened her mouth to ask another question, then closed it with a snap, a chill sending more apprehension over her skin. “You think they knew we were here. Somehow, they knew we’d be here?”
“Yes,” Girard said, voice clipped.
“Could someone have followed us?” Hallie asked. “I mean, we lost the fifth man in Minamaan, but they could have identified us and tailed us today.”
“Possible,” Girard said. He didn’t sound convinced. “I don’t remember anyone following us on the roads, and I’d have noticed the van.”
And then there was no more time for talking.
There were muffled voices from the other side of the door.
Too faint for Hallie to make out the words, although she did pick up the angry tone.
Then the door moved a fraction, as if someone had pushed it from the other side.
When the door didn’t give easily, the chair providing resistance, the movement ceased.
Hallie tensed. She didn’t think that the attackers were just going to give up.
A moment later and the door exploded into thousands of splinters that flew through the air of Zurine’s apartment, slamming into the desk, the walls, the carpet, the ceiling.
Hallie ducked further down and covered her head with one arm on instinct, feeling bits of wood raining onto her jacket.
Deafened by the explosion, she risked a quick look up over the side of the desk as the rain stopped, just in time to see five people coming into the apartment.
Three clad head to toe in black, moving with fluid grace, and two bringing up the rear, one of them limping badly, heads uncovered, guns held ready.
Despite the number of weapons now in the room, Hallie’s first and overwhelming concern wasn’t for the danger of bullets but for the fact that the attackers had somehow managed to get through the flexi-cuffs that she and Girard had put on the pair in the entryway.
Having worked with the cuffs for a decade, Hallie knew - from training and experience - that they were impossible to break.
They could only be undone with a particular fob, keyed to the right code.
It should not have been possible for the five people entering Zurine’s apartment to have broken through flexi-cuffs.
Then the first attacker came level with the desk and Hallie forced her attention back to the immediate and very real danger.
From his position next to her, Girard fired.
A single shot. Preserving his ammunition, Hallie guessed.
The bullet entered the attacker’s upper arm and the person stumbled away, crying out in what sounded like fury and pain combined.
They stumbled over a piece of furniture and fell backwards even as the remaining attackers turned their attention onto Hallie and Girard’s position.
The attackers had no concern about using ammunition. A hail of bullets sprayed into the desk and the wall around where Hallie and Girard were huddled. But somehow didn’t hit them.
Hallie slumped against the desk, feeling cold and faint at the same time, energy drained out of her, and realised that the zauber was a point of fire at her hip.
“Are you hit?” Girard asked, glancing at her, concern on his face.
“No. Zauber,” Hallie managed to say. “Shielding.” She couldn’t see anything, even though her eyes were open. Everything was murky and dark. She closed her eyes and the tiny bit of energy she’d been using for sight got funnelled into the shield that the zauber was holding.
“It’s working,” Girard said, and she felt a brief, warm pressure on her arm as if he’d put his hand there.
Even as she welcomed the connection, she couldn’t acknowledge it, could barely keep her breathing even as the attackers kept firing.
She was dimly aware of Girard returning fire.
The gun firing so close to her head should have been loud but it was the faintest whisper.
Another breath and every strike of a bullet against the shield was a sharp point of pain that grew and grew until they were all red-hot agony.
She was boneless and helpless, unable to do anything apart from hold that shield.
Hold the shield. Protect Girard. Everything was black and red and white hot pain pain pain.