The Illuminati Sanctum (The Relic Hunters 6) by David Leadbeater (best mobile ebook reader .txt) 📕

crawled around them and then paused behind the guards. Bodie caught the eyes of both women and nodded.

Together, they rose up, rocks in hand, and smashed them down across the skulls of the guards. Both men fell forward. Bodie scrambled over a boulder, landing on the back of his man, and slammed his rock down again.

The man grunted into rock and dirt, blood streaming across his head. Bodie hesitated to hit a third time, not wanting to kill his enemy in cold blood, not wanting to kill him at all.

Cassidy had rendered the other guy unconscious and was already holding his gun. Yasmine ducked as Bodie yelled at the last remaining guard.

“C’mere!”

The night and the ceaseless aquatic roar were broken by shouting. The Hoods streamed down the cliff face, guns at the ready. The guard stared at them and ran, looking confused. Bodie figured they had maybe five minutes.

The guard reached the end of the dock. Jemma lunged out of the shadows and knocked him to the side. The man staggered, but was strong and managed to steady himself, raising his gun.

Jemma ducked but Yasmine came up behind the guard and used her own rock to send him down to his knees. A second blow knocked him out.

Jemma was up and running, looking toward the speedboat. Bodie searched the guards and came up with four sets of keys. It would be better to take them all, eliminating any chance of pursuit. The Hoods were halfway down the cliff face already, taking extreme chances. One of their number had lost his footing and fallen, and was struggling to stand at the base of the rocks.

Bodie sprinted after Jemma.

They reached the speedboat together and jumped aboard. The craft bobbed and rolled in the choppy waters. It was dark blue, with a light pine trim. Bodie threw Jemma the keys and turned quickly to check on his friends.

They were running as a group, which was a mistake. The Hoods, realizing they’d never close the gap in time, were settling among the rocks and taking aim with their guns. Bodie yelled a warning.

Yasmine and Cassidy ducked low, slipping headlong to the wooden planking in their haste as the Hoods opened fire. Lucie was still blinking at Bodie in confusion as bullets ripped the air between them, slamming dangerously close into the dock and the side of the boat. Bodie threw himself to the floor, face nicked by a chip of wood.

Cassidy threw herself into the boat. Jemma turned the key and started the engines. A deep, rumbling sound came from the stern. Several more bullets crashed into the boat and a fourth shattered the windshield. Jemma ducked.

“We all here?”

 “Not quite.”

Bodie leaned over the side of the boat, dangerously exposed. Yasmine climbed over him. Lucie reached out for his hands and grabbed hold. Bodie hauled her into the boat and let her fall to the deck. A bullet smashed paint and woodchips from the place she’d just been.

“Go!” Cassidy cried out.

Jemma wrenched at the throttle, opening the engines and making them roar. The speedboat’s nose lifted as the craft churned at and then slipped over the bay’s rolling waters. Volleys of gunfire erupted as the Hoods emptied their weapons at them.

Bodie stayed low, rolling uncontrollably around the back of the boat with Lucie and Yasmine. Cassidy had the foresight to grab hold of a handle and, once it was obvious they were going to escape, burst into laughter.

“You guys.” She grinned. “You should go get a room.”

Bodie managed to flip her off but then slammed into the bulkhead, almost breaking his outstretched finger.

The speedboat vanished into the night.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Heidi Moneymaker fought a turbulent rush of emotions.

Guy Bodie had left her behind. That thought was foremost on her mind. Did everything they’d gone through mean nothing? Was the growing sense of affection she’d felt between them merely her own mind playing devious tricks?

Or was Bodie being devious? Using her. Playing her. Well, at this rate she’d never find out.

They were in the dark, quite literally. The night was pitch black, and the streets of London were ill lit. These weren’t the fancy streets of Knightsbridge, Mayfair or Belgravia where wealthy residents only had to rattle their wallets in the direction of the police or a local council puppet to ramp up patrols, stop cars or fix a light bulb, this was the heart of the hard-working Londoner, where opinions held a lesser value.

Heidi walked alongside Kenny Pang, the CIA hitman, on yet another dead end street. They’d tracked Bodie and the gang to London, to this general area, but could find no trace of the fixer that had helped with their new identities. Apparently, her name was Giselle Van Santen but, just as apparently, she didn’t exist.

“Wild goose chase number five,” she said aloud, her breath fogging in the near zero temperatures. “Begin.”

Pang glared at her but said nothing.

Heidi walked at his side, the frigid cold few feet that separated them as much a mental barrier as physical. She blamed Pang for everything that had gone wrong with her handling of the relic hunters. She blamed him—through his superiors—for pursuing other agendas. So here she was—thousands of miles from home, from her office, and more importantly from her daughter. Here she was, forced to work with a man she hated, to catch a man she... loved?

That wasn’t true... but the possibility had been there.

Now she would never know. She backed Pang up as he knocked at another faceless door, interviewed the angry woman in a white bathrobe that lived there, and turned away, once more at a loss.

“It’s been far too long,” Heidi said. “We might as well go back to DC and start over. Work the facial rec angle.”

“We have people doing that already, as you know,” Pang said.