The Edge of Armageddon by David Leadbeater Read Free Book Online

guilty, until he remembered what he was running for.
    You’ll thank me later.
    But, of course, she would never know. Whatever happened.
    Now Beau shot left, running down the Avenue of the Americas towards 47 th Street. A Magnolia Bakery passed by on the right, making Drake think of Mano, and then what the Hawaiian might have gleaned from Ramses by now. Two minutes later and they were blasting up 47 th , Times Square suddenly visible to their left. The customary Starbucks sat to their right, bustling and queuing out the door. Drake scanned faces as he dashed by, but didn’t expect to come face to face with any suspects.
    Four minutes.
    Time was spinning away faster and even more precious than the last moments of a dying old man. The hotel’s gray façade and golden entrance appeared to the left, fronting the sidewalk, and Beau was the first to swing through the front doors. Drake skirted a luggage trolley and a dangerously reversing yellow cab to follow Mai inside. A wide foyer and patterned red carpet greeted them.
    Beau and Alicia were already pressing the call buttons for separate elevators, hands close to concealed weapons, as a security guard watched them. Drake thought about producing the SPEAR team ID card, but it would only lead to more questions and the countdown was already inside the final three minutes. A chime announced that Alicia’s elevator had arrived and the team piled on. Drake stopped a young man from joining them, warding him off with an open palm. Thank God that worked, because the next gesture would have been a closed fist.
    The four-strong team gathered themselves as the car rose, shaking off the run and drawing weapons. Once the door opened they piled out, searching for room 201. Instantly, a whirlwind of fists and legs was among them, shocking even Beau.
    Somebody had been waiting.
    Drake flinched as a fist connected above his eye socket but ignored the flash of pain. A foot tried to sweep his own but he sidestepped. The same figure moved away and beset Alicia, slamming her frame into the plastered wall. Mai stopped blows with raised hands and then Beau struck fast, a one-two that stopped all momentum and drove their attacker to his knees.
    Drake leapt up and then punched downward with all his strength. Time was ebbing away. The figure, a chunky man wearing a thick jacket, shuddered under the Yorkshireman’s blow, but somehow managed to deflect the worst of it. Drake fell to the side, unbalanced.
    “A punching bag,” Mai said. “He’s a punching bag. Positioned to slow us down.”
    Beau drove in harder than before. “He is mine. You go.”
    Drake jumped over the kneeling figure, checking room numbers. Their destination sat only three rooms away and they had one minute left. They were down to the final seconds. Drake paused outside the room and kicked at the door. Nothing happened.
    Mai pushed him aside. “Move.”
    One high kick and the wood splintered, a second and the frame collapsed. Drake coughed. “Must have weakened it for you.”
    Inside, they spread out, guns ready and searching quickly but the object they sought was terribly obvious. It lay in the middle of the bed—an A4 size glossy photograph. Alicia approached the bed, staring from side to side.
    “The room is immaculate,” Mai said. “No clues, I will bet.”
    Alicia paused at the side of the bed, looking down and breathing shallowly. She shook her head and groaned as Drake joined her.
    “Oh God. Is that a—”
    The ringing telephone interrupted him. Drake leapt around the bed to the nightstand and snatched the receiver from the cradle.
    “Yes!”
    “Ah, I see you made it. Couldn’t have been easy.”
    “Marsh! You crazy bastard. You’ve left us a photograph of the bomb? A fucking photograph?”
    “Yes. Your first clue. Why, did you think I’d let you have the real thing? So stupid. Send it to your leaders and your eggheads. They will verify the serial numbers and all that other rubbish. The canisters of Plutonium