With a few measured breaths, Gage sprang from his position, tearing across the oversize bed in two bounds—his previous injury firing flares of pain into his back. As he propelled himself off the far side of the bed, his near deaf ears registered another cannon shot from behind him. Straight ahead and down, right where he thought he’d be, Gage made out the lighter shade of Boden’s silhouette, cowering on the floor. Gage landed on the Ministerpräsident, ignoring his own revulsion over the fact the man had no clothes on.
With his left hand clamped on the back of Boden’s neck, Gage peeked over the bed, seeing only a rectangle of amber light coming from the doorway. The breaker had likely tripped for this room only. To the left, in the center of the mirror, was the hole evidencing the second blast from the shotgun. Gage knew he was on borrowed time, but thankfully he now had Boden as a shield.
Speaking of Boden…
Gage pivoted, pounding down with the pistol in a terrific hammer blow. He hit the Ministerpräsident squarely on the back of his head, feeling the man go limp. For good measure, Gage rested both knees on the man’s back—that way he would be able to tell if he was regaining consciousness.
With no one in the doorway, Gage used a two handed grip, resting both elbows on the bed and aiming into the doorway. The aiming adjustment would be slight, depending on whether the shooter emerged from right or left.
But whoever the shooter was, he or she wasn’t stupid. They knew Gage had adjusted position and they, like Gage, were probably now waiting patiently for Gage to make the first move.
Gage was also patient.
He trusted the French mobsters heard the shots and were on their way to help.
A minute passed. Boden moved, but just barely.
Another minute. Now Boden stirred, but not much. He was held firmly under the weight of Gage’s 205 pounds.
Still no French mobsters.
In the third minute, Gage detected the slightest change in the light coming through the doorway. On the right side, the light darkened just slightly. Someone was edging from that direction. Perhaps they thought they hit Gage with that last shot. Gage applied a few pounds of pressure to the trigger of the P9.
Concentrate…
Concentrate…
Startlingly fast, the figure shot into the doorway and pivoted left with the shotgun. Had Gage been able to watch the entire scene in slow motion, he’d be amazed that he only fired two-tenths of a second before the shooter fired. The three steel balls of tri-ball buckshot missed Gage’s head by the width of his own hand.
Due to his own positioning, the shot from Gage’s pistol had been true, striking the shooter in his abdomen and sending him crumpling to the floor. Gage stood. Using his left hand while keeping aim on the downed man, Gage lifted Boden by his hair, shoving him forward and around the bed.
“Can you hear?” Gage roared.
Boden nodded.
“Get your ass out there and kneel behind that man. Put your hands on your head and don’t move. And if you get near that shotgun, you’re a dead man.”
Despite the ringing in his ears, Gage realized the woman in the closet was screaming. He leaned to the door and told her to shut up.
She did.
Boden obeyed Gage’s instruction, limping as he walked. At the doorway, Gage held his pistol on Stephan, Boden’s security man. He moved past him, finding a light switch outside the bedroom. Now, light from the common area flooded the scene.
Stephan’s blood pooled around him. From many years of experience, Gage could tell the man was breathing his final breaths. They were wet and raspy as his blood soaked hands clutched his midsection.
The breathing soon stopped.
Gage kicked the shotgun away. Pistol still trained on Boden, Gage phoned Marcel, telling him to come inside.
* * *
In the half hour that passed, Gage began to realize the gravity of what he’d done. He’d meticulously planned the breaking and entering of a sitting German governor’s estate, and colluded with a known organized crime syndicate in order to pull it off. And upon doing so, he killed one of the governor’s underlings who might well be a state employee. That was the bad part. The good part was the taking down of a murdering piece of shit who used the guise of public service while making millions and killing anyone who stood in his way.
After Marcel had eventually come inside, he’d had one of his men—mercifully, for everyone else—place a robe over the nude Ministerpräsident’s body. Marcel’s men then hoisted Boden and secured him to a chair. The two armed mobsters now stood next to Boden, daring him to say a word.
Gage confirmed that Stephan was indeed dead. Another of Marcel’s men covered him before he escorted the woman from the closet to a room downstairs. She was now on her second glass of premium vodka and feeling much better about things.
Upstairs, while Ministerpräsident Boden stared on in horror, Gage and Marcel openly deliberated on how best to deal with him. Always the direct one, Gage mentioned simply driving Boden to the BKA—the Bundeskriminalamt, Germany’s version of the FBI—and telling them everything.
“Let the BKA figure it out.”
“If you do that, he’ll lawyer up and might worm his way out of it,” Marcel countered. “Don’t forget, he’s a politician. He’s going to blame everything on the dead man.” Marcel gestured to the corpse covered by a bloody sheet.
“Stephan.”
“Right. He’ll blame him, and Schulz, and Il Magnifico, and even Karl Vogel. All you’ll have on him is adultery and some cocaine residue.”
“That’s not all I have,” Gage answered.
Marcel stared blankly before it hit him. He arched his eyebrows as recognition flooded his face. “I didn’t even think about that.”
Gage
