Gambit by David Hagberg (fantasy novels to read txt) 📕

and scoped the rise ahead, but nothing was visible. The Russians hadn’t retreated; they were just keeping low. “Dawn will be in a couple of hours. We can wait until then.”

Still there was no answer.

“The EUTELSAT won’t be down forever. Maybe another half hour or so, and then you’ll be screwed.”

“What do you propose?” a man speaking broken English came back in Mac’s earbud.

“You have an exfiltration plan; leave the field now and go home.”

“How do I know you won’t shoot when I retreat?”

“You don’t,” McGarvey said. But something about what the man said and his tone didn’t sit right.

“Then what are my alternatives?”

McGarvey suddenly knew. The man had said: When I retreat. Then what are my alternatives? He was stalling for time.

“Sherman, incoming!”

Alicia rolled over, bringing her Glock up, when one of the black-clad operators rose up just a few inches directly behind her and pointed the room broom at her head.

“Nyet,” he said softly.

Sherman tensed, ready to bring her gun hand around and take the shot anyway, but the Spetsnaz operator shook his head.

After a couple of seconds, she relaxed. Very carefully, she lowered the pistol to the ground and pulled her hand back. “Do you understand English?”

“A little,” the Russian said.

“I have no other weapons,” she said, and she spread her hands. “I am surrendering. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“I’m going to get to my feet now,” she said, and before he could do anything, she slowly got to her feet, careful to keep her outstretched hands in plain sight.

The Russian said something into his lapel mic.

“I’m giving up!” she shouted toward where she figured the other Russians were positioned. “My name is Alicia Sherman; I am the assistant special agent in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s office in New York City. I want to speak with your squad leader.”

No one answered.

Without glancing back at the Russian on the ground behind, and keeping her hands out, she started across the open ground.

Vetrov was in a position now that he’d never been in before. For the most part, gun battles were fairly easy affairs and usually only lasted a few minutes. But watching the woman approach, he had to admire her guts, and yet she was a part of the opposition force, and his inclination was to simply shoot her.

“Come no farther!” he shouted. The woman was fifteen yards out.

She kept coming, her pace slow but even.

“Stop, or we will be forced to shoot you!” Vetrov shouted.

“You should have had the man who’s hiding back there in the dirt do it when he snuck up on me in the dark like a coward.”

“Have you got a good sight line on where she was?” McGarvey asked, keeping his voice low.

“Yes,” Pete said.

“Keep on it. Anyone shows his head, don’t hesitate—just take the shot, and keep shooting even if he goes down.”

“What about you?”

“I’m going to finish it,” McGarvey said. Staying close to the ground, he scrambled up toward the operator he’d been talking to.

“Why’d I think he was going to say something like that?” Pete said to herself as Mac left.

Alicia stopped about halfway between where she’d been ambushed and where she thought the operator who’d given her orders had to be. Maybe twenty yards out.

“I’d say shit or get off the pot!” she shouted.

She could almost feel the laser gun sights on her back and chest.

It seemed like forever to her, the night silent except for her own breathing. The side of her head where she been hit with the buttstock was on fire and already swollen, and yet, although she was afraid for her life, she’d put that in a separate compartment. Now it was between the operator behind her and the one in front, and McGarvey and Pete down the hill.

Coming out to provide a distraction had been her only remaining option to help.

“Well, you sons of bitches!” she shouted. “What’s it to be?”

“Nyet!” the Russian ahead of her shouted.

Alicia dropped to the ground and covered her head with both arms. “Your turn, guys,” she said softly.

The Russian behind Alicia popped up, his figure perfectly showing in Pete’s night vision optics.

He started to raise his weapon, and Pete fired, missing with the first rounds to the right, but walking them left and hitting him center mass with at least three rounds, sending him backward.

She continued firing until her room broom went dry. Ejecting the spent mag, she picked up a spare, knocked it against the weapons handle, rammed it home, cycled a round into the chamber, and brought it up.

There was nothing moving, nothing left to shoot at. And after the terrific noise of the unsilenced weapon in her hands, the night was suddenly silent again, except maybe for a police siren from down across the bay.

The Russian had raised up a few inches, his room broom pointed to where Alicia had dropped.

McGarvey rose up and touched the back of the man’s head with his room broom’s muzzle. “Nice and easy now,” he said.

Vetrov lay perfectly still.

“Despite everything, I don’t want to kill you. All I want are answers.”

“Mr. McGarvey, I presume?”

“Yes. You?”

“Senior Lieutenant Boris Vetrov.”

“Spetsnaz?”

“The 329th.”

“I’ve heard of your unit,” McGarvey said. “But frankly, I’m surprised that you and your operators chose a dishonorable discharge and some money to take on a job like this. Who hired you?”

“I won’t say.”

“Won’t or can’t?”

“I’m not going to sit out the rest of my life in an American prison somewhere,” Vetrov said.

“And I’m not going to let you walk away,” McGarvey said. “We’re clear up here,” he called.

“You okay?” Pete shouted back.

“Yes. Alicia, how about Bender?”

“He’s dead,” Alicia said.

“Did you bring any restraints?”

“Flex-cuffs.”

“Bring them up,” McGarvey told her.

“I’m not going to let myself be taken to jail,” Vetrov said. “I’ll kill anyone who tries. The chance will come somewhere in transit, and I’ll take it. You must understand.”

“You’re well trained, and you’ll be treated with respect, but it won’t be local cops. Who knows? Maybe we’ll even trade you for someone the