The Last Protector(Clayton White #1)(70)

“Hey,” White said. “I need your help, buddy. Can you help me?”

Gradually, Pierre stopped shuddering, and his short legs unfolded. He got up to one knee and gazed at his surroundings, his eyes blank and unseeing.

The roar of incoming ATVs gave White an idea. It was risky, but it was an opportunity he couldn’t afford to miss. Not if they wanted to make it to the helipad in time for their pickup.

“I’ll be back,” White said to Pierre. Grabbing his M4, White started running parallel to the dirt path, staying close to the grapevines in an effort to stay concealed for as long as he could. In case a shooter was waiting for him on the other side of the vines, White didn’t want to show up too close to where he had last been seen.

In front of him, the vines took a sharp turn to the right, signaling a similar bend in the dirt path. White anticipated the ATVs would slow down right before the curve, unless the drivers wanted to flip their machines onto their sides.

They were getting closer. Almost on his heels. It was now or never.

White hopped on top of the small stone wall and raised his M4. The ATVs were a bit farther away than he had expected, but it wasn’t all bad. It gave him an extra second to adjust his aim. The ATVs were running without their front lights, but the moon provided enough illumination for White to align the front sight of his rifle with the torso of the man driving the lead ATV, now only a hundred feet away.

White exhaled and pressed the trigger five times in quick succession, his rounds slamming into the man’s chest, knocking him off his ATV. The ATV, having lost its driver, hit a bump on the dirt path and changed direction, heading straight toward White at thirty miles an hour.

White dove to his left and onto the dirt path just as the ATV struck the wall with an ear-splitting crash, sending bits of metal and stones into the air. The ATV caught fire but didn’t explode. White, who had landed on his stomach, raised his head just in time to see the second ATV coming straight at him.

He rolled hard to his left, leaving his rifle where it lay. The right front wheel of the SUV missed him by less than an inch but rolled over his M4. White watched in disbelief as the driver locked the wheel and tried to turn the ATV away from the upcoming wall.

The ATV almost tipped over and sent the driver flying off his seat. The driver bounced against the dirt path and rolled a few times, finally coming to a stop against the stone wall. To White’s surprise, the man instantly jumped back to his feet, like nothing had happened. He looked to his left and right, no doubt searching for his rifle. White didn’t know where the man’s weapon was, either, and since he wasn’t convinced his own rifle wouldn’t blow up in his face after being run over by the ATV, they stood facing each other in silence.

With lightning speed, the man pulled a knife from his rear pocket and opened the blade with a flick of his wrist. White did the same with the knife he’d seized from the man’s dead colleague.

The man attacked with speed and agility. Like White, this wasn’t his first knife fight. White blocked the man’s initial strike and backed off, trying to create some distance, despite knowing that he had to attack. In a knife fight, the person playing defense usually ended up dead. That advice had come from a gifted knife fighter: Maxwell White. The words of his father, during one of the rare times they’d bonded over military training, still echoed in his mind.

You will get cut. You will get hurt. Don’t be afraid of the pain. What you need to concern yourself about is the protection of your vital organs. Be the aggressor, Clay. Always be the aggressor.

White feinted a looping thrust to the man’s head. The tactic worked, and the man was suckered into a defensive cross slash. White easily avoided the blow and stepped into the opening he had created with a counterthrust to his attacker’s neck, his blade sinking into the man’s throat. By the time his opponent’s knife had slipped from his dying hands, White had already pulled his blade from the man’s neck and driven it into his heart. The man fell backward, twitched twice, then went still.

White ran to the dead man’s ATV, which had come to a stop against the stone wall. The ATV’s engine was still running, and it looked like it hadn’t sustained any critical damage. Wedged between the front of the ATV and the stone wall was the man’s rifle.

White reached for it, but as he did, he heard a voice behind him say, “You going somewhere, Clayton?”

White, startled and still slightly out of breath from the fight, raised his hands in the air and slowly turned toward the voice. Fifty feet away, Roy Oxley, now equipped with a pair of NVGs on his forehead, was pointing a rifle right at him.





CHAPTER FIFTY


Kommetjie, South Africa

Pierre Sarazin snapped his eyes open and looked around. His body jerked up at the sound of a loud crash not too far away from him. For a moment, he wondered where he was. Then he remembered. The last thing he recalled clearly was that he couldn’t breathe, that he’d had to sit down. Then White had left him. Where was the American? Had he abandoned him?

In front of him was his black pistol. Pierre took it in his hand, vividly remembering the two shots he’d fired with it into the back of one of Oxley’s men.

Merde! What happened to me? Never in his life had his body shut down on him like this. He glanced at his watch. It was almost eleven o’clock. The helicopter. Had he told White about the chopper? He couldn’t remember. Hammond had been very specific about this. The chopper was going to land on Oxley’s helipad at precisely eleven o’clock, and it wouldn’t stay longer than sixty seconds.