Ultimate Weapon (McClouds & Friends #6)(144)

András complied eagerly. The rope wrenched her up off her feet.

She hated herself for the shriek that scorched her throat. And for being so vulnerable. For having loved Val for even an instant, for having believed him. For getting caught. For everything. All of it. Rachel. Oh, Rachel.

She struggled to get a better grip on the rope with her left hand. Ten seconds. Ten centuries of lightning stabbing through her nerves.

She sobbed in air and hung on, delirious with pain—

Thud, down she went onto her floppy tied ankles. She clung to consciousness, and attempted the agonizing task of trying to stand again.

“Enough chatter.” The old man suddenly sounded irritable and exhausted. “András, go get the child. I want to begin.”

András wound the rope around a hook set into the wall at waist level, knotting it with a jerk. She gasped at a blaze of fresh agony. He strode purposefully out of the room, leaving her alone with Novak.

“The stupidity of women is always a fresh surprise,” Novak mused. “You are very beautiful, it is true, but even so, it is obvious to what you are, what you exist for. You are a disposable toy, Tamara. How could a man declare love for a thing like yourself? Men don’t love women like you. They use them and discard them like the trash that they are.” He took a step closer. “But still, I’m surprised you were taken in so easily.”

Part of her was on her knees, no, on the ground, writhing and wailing yes, it’s true, yes, just kill me please and have done with it.

The other part whispered, come a little closer, you sick filthy f*ck.

She moved the tongue studs in her mouth, positioning the poison capsule between her molars and trying to work up enough spit to deliver it. Difficult, with such a parched mouth. She would have to be spot-on accurate. She tried to sniff down her useless tears of terror and agony and make them good for something.

Come on, old man. Two more steps. Just two, and I’ll melt the organs inside your body into slop.

Faster. She snorted, sniffed. Novak’s weight shifted. Time slowed. She was so tuned in, she sensed his every tiny movement as if her own body was making it.

Finally. The mix of tears and saliva in her mouth was ready to spit as he moved closer…jaws ready to chomp, lungs ready to provide air to propel her liquid projectile…closer—

Ding, ding. A soft, musical chiming sound shattered the moment. Novak broke eye contact, turned to look at the intercom on the table.

She almost screamed her disappointment. So f*cking close!

Novak punched the button. “I told you I was not to be disturbed!”

“They’ve brought in Luksch,” a male voice on the intercom informed him.

Novak’s face changed. “Oh. Excellent. Bring him in, then.”

He turned back to Tam, rubbing his hands together. Too far away from her. The moment had slipped away. She wanted to wail, shriek.

“Georg has been bad,” Novak confided. “Wanting you for himself, even knowing how you had wronged me. Then I discovered that he was planning to murder me and take over my business! Can you imagine it? Millions spent grooming him to take over Kurt’s place! Ingrate! He will watch his toy smashed. That’s what happens to little boys who grab, grab, grab. I taught my Kurt that lesson, too. He learned it early. That’s what made him so strong, so unusual. Do you remember how strong he was, Tamara? Ah, Georg, my dear. There you are.”

Two large men hustled Georg into the room. The man’s face was battered, his lip split. Older bruises decorated him as well, relics from his fight with Val in the hotel blooming under both his eyes, purple and blue. His teeth were clenched, except for the gaps where two of them had been knocked out by Val in the hotel. His eyes were wild with rage.

There had to be some way that Tam could turn this new wrinkle to her advantage, but if there was, she could not see it. She was too scared, too crazed with pain to crunch the data.

“There she is, Georg,” the old man crooned. “Your heart’s desire. The woman who plotted your best friend’s murder. But perhaps he was not quite such a friend as we all thought, eh?”

Georg’s thin, scabbed lips drew back like a snarling dog’s.

No. This could not possibly help, she concluded bleakly. Georg was bound hand and foot, a gun to his head. As badly off as she was herself. No, she needed a miracle. On the scale of an earthquake, a volcano, a tornado, a bomb, a meteor—

“Ey!” Georg shouted. He sagged to the ground between the two men who clutched his arms—and the room exploded.

Windows shattered with an enormous crash and glass flew, peppering her face and body with stinging shards. The mirror exploded and toppled backward. One of the men who had been holding Georg was hurled down onto his back. His jaw was torn away, a red, raw mess of torn meat, white glints from shattered bone and teeth showing through. He pawed at himself, eyes white-rimmed, rolling with panic.

Bam. The other man holding Georg clapped his hand to his throat. Blood jetted, black in the candlelight. It gushed through his fingers. His gun thudded to the carpet. He toppled, bounced, lay still.

The sudden silence was deafening. Georg sat up in a leisurely, unhurried way. He reached for the nearest gun, scanning the room through narrowed eyes. Cold air swirled through the empty window frames. The flames in the candelabra flared hellishly high. Tam watched the tableau, soul shaking with shock…and astonished hope.