citizens.
“Lead, this is Base,” one of the two technicians inside the van radioed, sounding rattled. “What should we do?”
Randi switched back to her primary channel. “Just sit tight, guys. I’m coming. Let me handle this.”
She was still at least fifty meters away when the three black-clad gunmen suddenly opened fire, shooting without any warning or provocation.
Their submachine guns stuttered on full automatic, raking the van from back to front at pointblank range. Showers of sparks cascaded high in the air as dozens of 9mm rounds ripped through the vehicle, puncturing metal, shattering fragile electronics gear, and shredding human flesh. Most of the bullets punched straight through and came out on the other side still moving at close to the speed of sound. But enough hit home to turn the interior of the Ford into a blood-drenched slaughterhouse. Through her earphones, Randi heard agonized screams that were mercifully cut short as the hail of submachine gun fire went on and on.
These must be Renke’s men, she realized in horror. They had not come to rescue Kessler. Instead, they had come to kill those who were keeping watch on him.
Snarling in rage, Randi drew her Beretta, aimed rapidly at the nearest gunman, and squeezed off two shots. One round missed. The other hit the man high in the chest. But instead of dropping him, the impact only knocked him backward a couple of paces. He grunted, doubled over for a brief moment, and then straightened back up. She could see the hole torn in his clothing, but there was no sign of any blood.
Christ, she realized suddenly, these bastards are wearing body armor. Her survival instincts kicked in and she threw herself sideways, diving for cover behind a Volvo parked along the side of Clayallee.
The man turned fast in her direction, bringing his submachine gun up in the same, whirling movement. He fired a long burst, spraying bullets toward the Volvo.
Lying prone behind the parked car, Randi buried her head in her hands as the Volvo shuddered and rocked above her, hit repeatedly at close range. Bits and pieces of shredded metal, glass, and plastic spun away across the street.
Ricochets and near misses cracked by low overhead. They tore into other parked vehicles or spun away off the pavement, hurling shards of shattered concrete in all directions. Karsplitting car alarms began going off up and down the avenue, triggered by the barrage of sudden impacts.
The shooting stopped suddenly.
Breathing hard, Randi rolled back out onto the sidewalk with her Beretta held out in front of her and ready to fire. She saw two of the black-clad gunmen scrambling back into the BMW. The third had slung his submachine gun across one shoulder and stood hunched over, fiddling with what looked like a small green canvas bag.
This time, she took careful aim, extending the Beretta in a two-handed marksman’s grip. She waited until her pistol’s sights settled on the third gunman and held steady. Then she squeezed the trigger. The Beretta barked once, recoiling back against her tight grip. Nothing. A miss. Randi’s eyes narrowed, focusing on her target. She steadied the pistol again and took another shot.
This 9mm round slammed into the gunman’s upper right leg, shattered his femur, and exploded out the other side in a spray of blood and bone fragments. He sat down suddenly, staring in disbelief at his mangled leg. The canvas bag tumbled out of his hands and fell to the street.
A look of desperation flashed across the wounded man’s face. He lashed out with his left foot, kicking the bag away from him. It spun wildly across the ground and ended up under the bullet-riddled CIA surveillance van.
Randi heard the crippled gunman shout a panicked warning in what sounded like some kind of guttural Slavic language. Immediately, one of his comrades leaned out of the BMW, grabbed him under the arms, and hauled him inside, leaving a pool of bright red blood smeared across the street.
Without waiting any longer, the driver of the black sedan hit the gas pedal and peeled out, accelerating back up Clayallee the way thev had come. Pistol in hand, Randi scrambled to her feet. She swung the Beretta through a wild, wide arc, leading the BMW as it flashed past her at well over eighty kilometers an hour. She squeezed the trigger repeatedly, trying to fire as many shots as she could at the fast-moving target.
One of her rounds smashed the car’s rear window. A second hit punched a hole in the trunk. But the others went wide. Cursing under her breath, she stopped shooting, not willing to risk hitting innocent bystanders by mistake.
The BMW kept going, heading north along the avenue until at last it disappeared in the gathering twilight.
For a moment longer, Randi stood staring along the street in sheer disbelief. She felt stunned by the magnitude of this unhesitating and utterly murderous assault on her surveillance team. How in God’s name had this happened? she wondered bitterly. How could Wulf Renke’s men have zeroed in on them with such unerring precision?
Slowly, she lowered the Beretta and forced herself to flip the safety catch on. It was not easy. Her hands were starting to shake as the wild exhilaration of close combat ebbed away, leaving only sorrow and a deep, abiding anger in its place. Then Randi glanced back over her shoulder at the bullet-shattered Ford van.
The small canvas bag was just visible. It was lying on its side beside one of the rear wheels.
A bag, her mind said. Then, a split-second later, her mind corrected itself.
No, she thought coldly. That’s a bomb?a satchel charge.
Run, Randi told herself. Run away now! Her mind suddenly in overdrive, she turned and fled, sprinting away from the van as fast as she could move.
Gun in hand, she raced past stalled cars whose drivers were still staring in shock at the mangled van.
“Get out! Get out!” she yelled at them in German, gesturing with the Beretta. “There’s a bomb!”
And then the satchel charge exploded.
A sudden flash of blinding white light ripped through the darkness behind Randi. Still running flat-out, she hurled herself down, curling up for protection just as the shock wave, roaring outward from the very center of the powerful blast, rolled over her. The massive wall of superheated air bounced her high off the pavement and then tossed her tumbling end over end across the ground. At the same time, a giant fist?the overpressure caused by the blast-seemed to squeeze every ounce of oxygen out of her lungs.
Slowly, the flaring white light faded. Everything went piteh-black. The world around her vanished as she fell out and away from consciousness.
She came to only seconds later, lying curled up against the side of a car thrown sideways across the road by the blast. Half deafened, with her ears still ringing, Randi forced herself first to sit up and then to climb back to her feet, wincing unwillingly at the pain from tortured muscles and bruised and bleeding patches of skin.
All around her on the street, other dazed and injured people were pulling themselves out of vehicles that had been hammered by the shock wave or hit by flving debris. Others, streaked with blood or cradling broken limbs, were stumbling blindly out of their bomb-damaged homes and businesses. The enormous explosion had torn open roofs, toppled chimneys, and shattered Every window facing the street, sending shards of broken glass sleeting through living rooms, kitchens, bedrooms, and storefronts.
Slowly, Randi turned and stared back at the place where the surveillance van had been.
The Ford was gone, replaced by an ugly tangle of twisted, burning wreckage. All of the other cars that had been parked within fifty meters of the shattered van now lay canted across Clayallee? crumpled, smashed, and wreathed in billowing orange and flame. Thick black smoke drifted across the road.
Randi blinked away tears. There was no time now for sorrow, she decided coldly. If she lived long enough, that would have to come later.
Forcing herself to focus, she quickly checked over her equipment. Her radio was dead, probably wrecked beyond repair when the explosion sent her skittering across the pavement. Well, it doesn’t really matter, she thought bleakly. After all, she had no one left to contact. She spotted her Beretta lying on the sidewalk a few meters away and awkwardly limped over to pick it up.
Frowning in concentration, Randi carefully examined the pistol. Although the Beretta’s grip and barrel were scraped and scarred, its firing pin, trigger spring, hammer, and slide all appeared undamaged. One side of her mouth twitched upward in a bitter, self-mocking grin. From the look of it, the 9mm weapon was in better shape than she was.
She hit the magazine release catch, dumped out the half-empty clip, and dropped it into one of her jacket
