He shook his head. ‘A deal is a deal.’
‘It wasn’t on the island,’ Herrick snapped.
Loz turned with one hand still restraining Khan. ‘Shoot them if they talk. Shoot them…’
The rest of the sentence was obliterated by a crack of lightning overhead. The Empire State was tapping the storm and drawing its power to earth. The lights flickered again and then went out completely. Gibbons hurled himself at Foyzi. Eva went to the right, rolling and springing to her feet like a gymnast to deliver several ferocious kicks to Foyzi’s upper body, just as he loosed off three rapid close-range shots at Gibbons. The gun dropped from his hand with the final kick. Herrick dived for it and came to her feet, aiming at Loz, who had not moved from his position near the window. She glanced left and right. Gibbons was hit; Foyzi lay dead from stab wounds from a knife still in Gibbons’ hand.
Nathan Lyne ran panting to Harland’s room after being driven across London in an unmarked Special Branch police car that topped 100 mph on the flat of Park Lane.
Harland had put the phone down on Ollins a few minutes before. ‘She’s in the Empire State,’ he said, turning to his address book. ‘The FBI man left her in Loz’s old office. She’s there by herself. I’m calling a friend who was due to meet her.’
Nathan took the hospital phone and spoke on the open line to Vauxhall Cross. ‘You got all that?’ he said. ‘What floor?’
‘Sixty-fourth,’ said Harland, hearing the first rings on Eva’s phone.
Eva heard her phone ringing out in reception and prayed it would be her headquarters in Tel Aviv. She ran out and picked it up, together with the gun that Foyzi had taken from Gibbons.
‘Yes?’ she barked, turning back to the room.
‘It’s Bobby. Where are you?’
‘The Empire State.’
‘Isis kept her phone on. We heard something. Is Loz alive? What the hell’s happening?’
Eva went back into the room, where Herrick was on one knee beside Gibbons. ‘It’s okay,’ she said between breaths, ‘we disarmed them. Your friend is here. She’s got Loz and Khan covered.’
Harland began to speak, but Eva lowered the phone because Gibbons was saying something. His voice was a whisper. ‘If you say where we are, every fucking jackass cop will be here. We don’t have time for that. We don’t know what these men have planned. We can’t let them be arrested.’
‘You’re losing blood,’ said Herrick. ‘You need to get to a hospital.’
‘Forget that,’ said Gibbons. ‘Just get these bastards talking.’
Harland told Lyne what he’d just heard on Eva’s phone. ‘They’re with another man – an American. They seemed to have overpowered Loz. This man has been hit, I think. He’s insisting they don’t get help until they’ve found out what Loz was planning.’
Lyne frowned. ‘What the heck are they doing?’ He stopped and met Harland’s eyes, then spoke to Vauxhall Cross. ‘The situation is under control. Tell the FBI to hold off. This is very important.’
Eva put her phone on the table, went over to Loz and placed Gibbons’s gun at his temple. At the same moment, Herrick seized the end of the bed and wheeled it away from them.
The two women said nothing to each other. The situation was beyond words.
Herrick looked down into Khan’s eyes and murmured, ‘I’m sorry. I have to do this.’ Without thinking any more, she raised Foyzi’s gun, and brought the silencer and barrel down on Khan’s still-bloated right foot. He shrieked. She looked up at Loz. ‘Tell us the plan. Tell us where your men are. How many of them?’
Loz shook his head in disbelief. ‘You cannot do this.’
‘Hurt him again,’ said Gibbons from the floor.
Herrick aimed and struck again. Although she pulled the blow at the last moment, the scream lasted much longer and died only when Khan had run out of breath. She paused. Her hand slipped to Khan’s side and momentarily snatched at his hand and squeezed it. The pressure was returned.
Now Eva worked on Loz. ‘We’ve only just started. We will cause your friend unimaginable pain. Are there five men or more? Where are they? Stop his suffering.’
Loz hung his head and then shook it.
Eva nodded at Herrick, who hit Khan again.
Gibbons had dragged himself from the floor. Holding his stomach with both hands, he lurched to where the food and the candles were by the window, picked up a plastic bag, then made his way to Herrick and handed it to her. Then he threw himself across Khan’s body, pinning him to the bed. Herrick looked down at Khan and wrapped the bag over his head.
‘No!’ shouted Loz. ‘I will tell you.’
Eva stepped back and reached for the phone. ‘Can you hear this, Bobby?’
Harland told her he could.
‘Tell us what the plan is. Then we’ll let your friend breathe.’
‘There are six,’ mumbled Loz. ‘Three in New York. Two in London. One in Holland.’
Eva repeated this to the phone.
Khan’s legs were trembling and jerking in the air, as though he was suffering a seizure.
‘Let him breathe,’ pleaded Loz.
‘What’s your plan?’ Eva screamed. ‘What’s your goddam plan?’ She hit him on the ear with the gun.
He shook his head again.
Herrick was now aware of Gibbons whispering to her. He was pointing to the TV monitor on the floor. ‘The cops are in the other room,’ he hissed. She glanced down and saw the figures darting across both halves of the split screen. She held the bag tighter round Khan’s head. His right hand weakly tore at Gibbons’s back. The other flailed in the air near Herrick. His legs stopped moving.
Eva stepped back from Loz. ‘Tell us and you’ll save him.’
‘They are martyrs. Martyrs with explosive. You understand! Martyrs! You cannot stop martyrs who give their lives to the struggle!’
‘Suicide bombers with Semtex, men spreading disease and toxic agents?’
He did nothing and she repeated the question, screaming in his ear.
He nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘When’re they going to attack?’
‘They have passes for two o’clock.’
‘American or European time?’
Khan had now stopped moving completely.
‘Please! Let him breathe!’ Eva signalled to Herrick, who pulled the bag from Khan’s head.
‘American time – after the other attacks.’
‘There aren’t going to be any other attacks. Who are these men?’
‘You know some of their names,’ said Loz. ‘I will tell you everything if you let Khan live.’
He gave them the names, haltingly, as if he couldn’t quite remember, but soon they had six names, only three of which Herrick recognised. He repeated them slowly again while Eva held the phone to his mouth. Langer, Khalil, Al-Ayssid, Ajami Hossein, Mahmud Buktar and Iliyas Shar. One American, three Arabs and two Pakistanis. He told them the men’s details. Their phone numbers and addresses were on a laptop by the table, which none of them had noticed before. Everything was there, including his last message to the martyrs.
Herrick looked down at her victim and nodded to him. Only she and Khan knew that she’d punctured the bag with her fingernails before wrapping it around his head. Despite the ferocious assault on his feet, he had gone along with her and play-acted his suffocation. She bent down, stroked his hair and kissed him on the forehead. Her other hand went to Gibbons’ shoulder.
Loz saw all this. He looked perplexed for a moment, then seemed to understand. ‘The goddess Isis used the essence of Ra to defeat him,’ he said. ‘That is what you did to me. You used my essence – my love for Karim – to defeat me.’
