The Gates of Hell (Matt Drake 3) by David Leadbeater Read Free Book Online Page B

mouth tightened into a tense white line.
    “You’re a man who’s given up. A quitter. A sacrifice. Impotent.”
    Boudreau moved toward her.
    Hayden pushed her face up against the bars, taunting him. “A fucking limp dick.”
    Boudreau struck out, but Hayden backed away faster, still forcing the grin on her face. The sound of his fist striking steel was like a wet slap.
    “So we wondered. What makes a man like you, a soldier, become a limp dick?”
    Boudreau now stared at her with slowly comprehending eyes.
    “That’s it.” Hayden mocked him. “You got there, didn’t you? Her name is Maria, yes?”
    Boudreau slammed the bars in an unspeakable rage.
    It was Hayden’s turn to sneer. “As I said. Impotent.”
    She turned away. The seeds were sown. It was about speed and severity. Ed Boudreau would never crack under normal conditions. But now. . .
    Kinimaka wheeled the TV they had strapped to a chair to where the mercenary could see it. The trepidation in the man’s voice was obvious even though he tried to hide it.
    “What the hell are you people trying to pull?”
    “Keep watching, motherfucker.” Hayden made her voice sound as if she just didn’t care anymore. Kinimaka turned the TV on.
    Boudreau stared. “No” he mouthed quietly. “Oh, no.”
    Hayden met his eyes with a totally believable sneer. “”We’re at war, Boudreau. You still don’t wanna talk? Choose a fuckin’ appendage.”
     
    *****
     
    Matt Drake made sure the camera was firmly fixed in position before he stepped into the picture. The black balaclava was pulled down over his features more for effect than disguise, but the body armor he was dressed in and the weapons he carried made the seriousness of the girl’s position stand out, starkly accurate.
    The girl’s eyes were pools of desperation, of fear. She had no idea what she had done. No idea what they wanted her for. She didn’t know what her brother did for a living.
    Maria Fedak was an innocent , Drake thought, if anyone was these days. Caught by chance, snared by misfortune in a globally cast net that fizzled and crackled with death, heartlessness and hate.
    Drake stopped next to her, brandishing the knife in his right hand, the other resting lightly on his gun. It didn’t matter to him anymore that she was innocent. It was retribution, nothing less. A life for a life.
    He waited patiently.
     
    *****
     
    “Maria Fedak,” Hayden said. “She is your sister, married, Mr. Boudreau. Your sister, oblivious, Mr. Mercenary. Your sister, terrified, Mr. Murderer. She doesn’t know what her brother is, or what he does on a regular basis. But she does know you. She knows the doting brother, who visits once or twice a year with the fake stories and the thoughtful gifts for her kids. Tell me, Ed, do you want them to grow up without a mother?”
    Boudreau’s eyes were bulging. His naked fear was so intense Hayden actually felt pity for him. But this wasn’t the time. His sister’s life was truly in the balance. That was why they had chosen Matt Drake, alone, as the point man.
    “Maria.” The word spilled out of him, wretched and despairing.
     
    *****
     
    Drake barely saw the terrified girl. He saw Kennedy, dead in his arms. He saw Ben’s blood-soaked hands. He saw Harrison’s guilty face.
    But most of all he saw Kovalenko. The Blood King, the mastermind, a man so hollow and void of feeling he might be nothing but an animated corpse. A zombie. He saw the man’s face and wanted to throttle the life out of everything around him.
    His hands moved toward the girl and locked around her throat.
     
    *****
     
    Hayden blinked as she watched the monitor. Drake was rushing things. Boudreau had hardly had time to soften up yet. Kinimaka stepped toward her, always the kind mediator, but Alicia Myles yanked him back.
    “Not a chance, big guy. Let these fuckers sweat. They have nothing but death on their hands.”
    Hayden made herself sneer at Boudreau the way she remembered him sneering