Rogue Read online

  And once they were in place – their work would hoist the Hellfire Club to a whole new level of power and influence, thus achieving the next step of their vast plan to control the world’s nations. It had been necessary to take their time, which was why it had taken eight years to get this far. They wanted complete secrecy, not even the faintest ripple across the dark and murky waters they were penetrating. It took patience. Deep planning. The infiltration of the criminal organisations was practically the final step toward their goal of achieving worldwide influence. After that, more opportunities would come.

  The problem had been finding all the treasurers at any one moment. Some roamed the world, or their city, whilst others lived in seclusion in the mansion owned by their bosses. Still, the plan was as solid as it could be. Herron had faith.

  Which brought him to the immediate issue. Tom Freeman. An operative, out of the blue, gone bad. And right in the middle of the biggest and most delicate operation they had undertaken in years. Was it the operation that had broken him, or something else? Herron knew it was imperative they track and kill him, and then delve deep into his life. They had recently taken him into their confidence for the treasurer job, needing a world-class assassin. They couldn’t allow him to continue running freely with everything he knew. What the hell was he doing in Cocoa Beach?

  As usual, the reports filtering through from the ongoing operation were sporadic and thin. To Herron’s mind, they were unreliable. He knew they had to get some hand-picked dependable operatives on site as soon as possible.

  Teams were on their way but the combat on the ground was fluid, fast and confusing. He’d heard reports of Tom fighting alone, fighting with a woman and even fighting with three other men. It sounded like local thugs trying to hide their incompetence. He couldn’t rely on any of it.

  Tom Freeman should be in Miami right now, specifically the Fontainebleau where the treasurer of the Romulus organisation, a large syndicate of drug runners operating between Florida and many of the Caribbean islands, habitually conducted his monetary affairs. The hit was planned for three hours from now. Luckily, they had back up – a new assassin was already en-route but it would delay the op.

  Herron believed he ran a fair operation. During his leadership only one asset had quit. Rogue. And damn it all to hell if she hadn’t been the best. Could Tom’s defection be connected to hers? Herron recalled they’d been together at one point, both romantically and professionally. Herron had never tracked her down. She’d never been taken into the inner circle and thus knew nothing. But Herron rued every day without her. Even now, seeing nothing through the glass pane except sheets of rain, his lips curled into a smile at the memory of all she’d accomplished without knowing the truth behind her missions.

  Once, she’d taken out three government employees on three continents. In the same day. She hadn’t been specifically asked to. The order was ‘as soon as possible’. She’d just done it to test herself without breaking the rules.

  Another time, she’d stole into an African warlord’s home and strapped a small bomb to his thigh whilst he slept. He hadn’t even noticed until he went to take a piss the next morning. This had not strictly been what Herron asked for. He had just wanted the guy blown up. But later she’d explained that it was her definition of how it should go down. The warlord had preyed on innocent women and children. He had no morals, or honour. In her mind, he deserved a hard death. She followed her own strict code, bending the rules but achieving results on her special terms.

  But this was early Rogue. The years had changed her. It was said operatives were only at their sharpest and most lethal for three years max. Rogue had excelled for four. It was such a shame she had been unable to see the greater vision behind the Hellfire Club’s use of agents such as her.

  He shook his head sadly. If only she’d understood. If only he’d had a chance to really mould her. To initiate her fully into the burning heart of the Hellfire Club.

  Many who knew about it made the mistake of thinking it was based here in London. Herron enjoyed leaving them in their ignorance. Thankfully he only had to travel to Paris once a year to attend an annual assembly. A waste of time really, but the Grand Master loved it. He would, of course, being the recipient of lavish gifts and unquestioning attention.

  But he digressed. All was on track except for the shitshow surrounding Tom Freeman. The office phone rang. His secretary put Vincent through.

  “Long day?” Vincent asked immediately.

  “Unquestionably,” Herron answered, surprised at the question. “This is the busiest time I’ve ever known.”

  The conversed quickly, communicating in code, organising their meeting for tonight.

  “Any more news on the external team?” Herron asked finally.

  “Of course, it’s not something I can discuss on the phone,” Vincent said. “But truth be told, there’s nothing new. At least, nothing significant.”

  Herron bit his bottom lip. “It’s evening over there now.”

  “Yes. That will make matters worse.”

  “And the tracker?”

  “Working perfectly. He has no idea it’s inside his body.”

  “Well, at least we have a replacement en-route.”

  “Yes, sir, that’s all gone without a hitch.”

  “Until tonight then. And please Vincent, do let me know immediately if there’s any news.”

  “Of course.”

  They signed off. Herron went back to watching the rain. This mission was the pinnacle of his leadership. Hatred filled his heart for the one man most likely to scupper it all.

  Tom Freeman – I will see you bleed your last drop of blood. I will laugh at your death throes. Crossing me, and the Club, will be the worst and last mistake of your life.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Before Tom could explain about Juliani, sirens shattered the night. Carrie grabbed him and pushed them both into deeper shadow. Flashes of blue lit the dark. Tom’s mouth was uncomfortably close to her right ear.

  Uncomfortably?

  Being honest, it was the exact opposite. If she hadn’t before Carrie realised then that she still had feelings for Tom.

  “They’re gone,” he whispered.

  Shit. She realised the lurid lights had passed them by almost half a minute ago. “I was just making sure,” she grunted.

  “So, about Juliani . . .”

  “Not now,” she said, not wanting to hang around in the shadows with him a moment longer. His explanation of why he was here could come later. “The quicker we reach my flat the better.”

  He appeared to understand and started walking toward the end of the alley. Carrie shook her head at his back and waited until he realised she wasn’t with him.

  Tom turned. “What is it?”

  “My op,” she said. “My rules. You should know I don’t follow.”

  His face scrunched. “More like you don’t trust.”

  “Can we not get back into that,” she started walking. “Not until we’re safe anyway.”

  “Lead the way,” he said with a touch of sarcasm.

  She didn’t take orders well. Never had. Even the army had struggled to smooth that rough edge. She stalked ahead of Tom and didn’t look back. She reached the end of the alley, spent a moment of appraisal, and then slipped into the shadows of a new street that led toward the beach. One block over she could see her block, the flats reaching several stories into the night. A sliver of moon had risen. She paused, hearing more sirens, but they quickly faded away. Other sounds filled the night around her. Revels in a local bar spilling from open windows and doors. A raucous car engine. A distant crowd of teenagers. There were no suspicious figures ahead and nothing lurked in the shadows.

  Maybe she should cut loose from Tom. It was him they were after, not her.

  He needs your help. So does Juliani.

  But he had refused to break away from the Hellfire Club when he had the chance. He didn’t believe me then, why should I trust him now?

&nbs
p; Because you want to reclaim your past.

  She stopped, angry with herself. Was she really standing up for him in her own mind? What the hell was that all about? She realised she hadn’t checked on him in a while and turned.

  “It’s just there,” she pointed at the tallest structure. “You ready?”

  Tom checked his gun and clip, then nodded. She hesitated, unable to push one important question aside. How had they found him? Tom insisted he hadn’t been followed. Their enemies had come upon them pretty quick at the mini mall.

  “Where’d you get the gun?” she asked.

  He glared. “I have a contact near the airport. Like most bloody assassins. Shit, Carrie, what do you take me for?”

  “Someone I want to rely on,” she said. “But who unwittingly brought the devil to my door.”

  She started off a moment later, confident they weren’t being watched. She knew Tom had her back and preferred to lead from the front as they headed into potential danger. She found a place that gave her a wide line-of-sight on the front door to her building and hunkered down. Two minutes later she crossed the road, tapped a code into a well-worn keypad and entered. Two flights of stairs took her to the front door of her room.

  “No tampering,” she reported, staring at the mechanism.

  “Be quick,” he said.

  “Just watch my back.”

  Even then, she couldn’t help checking the stairs above and below before entering her flat. Once inside, she listened and then checked the rooms before heading to her closet. At the back, nestled under shoes and clothes, sat a brand-new black suitcase with a coded lock. Inside that was a nylon backpack. She pulled the suitcase out of the wardrobe, laid it on the floor and quickly unlocked it.

  Inside the backpack, she found a Glock and spare ammo, which she loaded, and pushed down the back of her jeans. She pulled out fake passports, the wedge of dollars, the fake credit cards, the razor-sharp military knife, the medical kit, driving licenses, a high-quality sat nav and, probably most importantly, an untraceable SIG 9mm, automatic machine pistol. There were a couple of personal items too. Because of her trust issues and anxieties she’d sometimes found it necessary to swallow antacids on a regular basis. Carrie rummaged through several packets of sweet-smelling tablets. Finally, satisfied, she hefted the backpack and secured it over her shoulders.

  Tom turned as she appeared in the doorway. “You good?”

  “I’d be better if I hadn’t met you today.”

  She turned, understanding this might be the last time she saw her flat. Despite its scruffiness, its size and her neighbours she felt a pang of regret. It only ever offered the kind of security intrinsic to herself but she had made a home here. And, for the most part, she’d been welcomed.

  Tom stared as she closed and locked the door. “I’m sorry,” he said as if reading her thoughts.

  She checked her peripheries, focusing on the exfil. In light of the lack of attackers, she thought it acceptable to leave the same way they’d entered.

  “Stairs.”

  Carrie moved first, staying low, right hand close to the gun in her waistband. The entire building was eerily quiet. Her senses were attuned but detected nothing untoward. They reached the bottom floor and made for the exit door.

  She saw the first figure leaning against the glass, peering inside. Three more were walking past him, heading for the door. By the way their hands were poised close to their waists she knew they carried concealed weapons.

  No way. How is this possible?

  “Is there a back exit to this place?” Tom asked.

  She’d cased it when she moved in. Behind them stood a reception desk which, due to recent austerity cuts, was no longer manned. Beyond that a passage led to storage rooms and a rear door.

  “Follow me,” she turned.

  Before she could move the guy with his face pressed to the glass shouted. A second later the window shattered, and the sound of gunfire shattered the night. She ducked and whirled as shards of glass littered the floor in a wave that stopped just before the tip of her right boot. The shooter was getting ready to fire again, lining Tom up in his sights.

  Carrie fired first. The man flew back, a red bloom spreading across his white T-shirt. She backed away, covering the three trying to get through the door and waved Tom behind her.

  “Go, go.”

  He obeyed, running fast. She didn’t want to shoot again. Someone would already have called the cops. One bullet wouldn’t bring down the kind of heat that several more might. Tom shouted that he was in sight of the back door.

  All three men now dashed for the broken window, pulling blades from their waistbands. Carrie waved the gun,

  “Stop right there,” she said. “Whatever you’re here for, it’s not worth getting shot.”

  All three ignored her. Carrie cursed silently as they pushed forward.

  “Ready at the back,” Tom said.

  “Wait.” She wanted to be there when he opened the door. Their attackers might not be solid professionals, but they appeared to be red-hot when it came to tracking skills. She backed away, holding the gun steady, but the men kept walking, closing the gap.

  A blonde, to the right, said: “We’re not here for you, lady. Walk away. We won’t hurt you.”

  She frowned. Not because they were offering her a way out but because they assumed they could hurt her.

  “Well, that’s real nice of you,” she exaggerated the drawl in her fake American accent. “But how exactly could you hurt me?”

  “Well, because . . . because you’re-”

  She didn’t wait for them to finish. Just tucked the Glock back inside the waistband of her jeans and beckoned them forward.

  “Let’s see it then. Let’s see you hurt me.”

  “Carrie . . .” Tom’s warning was almost playful.

  She let the first knife skim past her ribs, trapped the arm, and jabbed the man hard in the throat. As he gasped and struggled, she pivoted quickly, putting him in the way of the second knife attack. She was close enough to hear the breath whistling through his clenched teeth as a one of his fellow assassins stuck five inches of hard steel through his back. Carrie then threw the man to the side. The one who’d stabbed him lost his grip on the blade and when Carrie faced him, looked decidedly sick.

  “What’s wrong, sweetheart?” she asked. “Please don’t cry.”

  She smashed a palm against the bridge of his nose so that water filled his eyes, then moved in and threw him over her shoulder. By then the blonde man had recovered enough to take a stab at her. She saw the attack from the periphery of her vision, knew from experience exactly what he was going to do and where he would attack.

  Thus, she knew the best counters.

  She evaded the blade by rolling under it and then jumped swiftly to her feet, making sure the top of her head impacted solidly with the underside of blondie’s chin. The impact of his teeth clacking together was gruesome, and so was the sight of the tip of his tongue flying past her right shoulder.

  “Shit,” she said. “Looks like I hurt you.”

  “Dammit, Carrie,” Tom was saying. “Stop playing with your food. There’s bound to be more of them. We have to put some distance between us and this place.”

  She grinned, feeling properly, savagely alive for the first time in two years. A nice-girl cover was all well and good, and it kept you hidden, but fifty-eight seconds of letting loose did wonders for your anger management.

  She felt more alive than she had in a long time. Her adrenaline was up. And she realised that she’d been lying to herself. Yes, she had done some terrible things, but she could start making up for them. What was true, however, was that she would never be a civilian. She hadn’t lost or killed the part of herself that had been Rogue. She had merely put it to sleep. But now, Rogue was awake again.

  She was Rogue. Carrie had been a mask. She couldn’t deny it any longer. Tom was right.

  She ran to Tom, slipped out her Glock and pressed down on the metal
bar. The back door clicked open. A narrow alley stretched left and right, cluttered by the usual assortment of bins, dumpsters and discarded carrier bags. A cool breeze swept across her brow, cooling the droplets of sweat that had gathered there.

  “Clear,” she said, and moved out.

  Instantly, two men stepped from behind the dumpster, guns levelled.

  Tom cried a warning, pushed her aside and fired four times. Two bullets glanced off the dumpster but two more found their targets. Both men went down, spouting blood, groaning and coughing.

  “Good shots,” Rogue said.

  “Marksman,” Tom reminded her.

  She’d forgotten how good he was. It was either that or she just couldn’t bring herself to let go of the reins. Probably the latter. She ran towards the downed men, scooped up their guns and headed for the far exit. They ran cautiously and kept checking back, above and to each side. It was ten minutes, and several cross streets later, when she turned and gave him a hard shove in the chest.

  “What the fuck is going on, Tom?”

  “I keep trying to explain.”

  “No, I mean with them continually finding us. I’ve been out of this for a while, but I can’t have slipped that badly.”

  Tom threw his hands up, equally exasperated. “I don’t know! I followed every protocol after landing. I changed clothes. I re-supplied from a trusted contact. I swept the bloody gun, the clothing, even the carry-on case that never left my sight.”

  “And under the skin?” she pushed.

  “That bug deactivated over a year ago. Some EMP frazzled it and I never bothered getting a new one.”

  “Then it’s you,” Rogue looked him up and down. “You’re the bug. It’s inside you. During the plane journey, did you eat? Did you drink?”

  Tom’s demeanour abruptly changed from exasperation to crestfallen concern. “Ah, no, you don’t think-”