Dungeon Royale (Masters and Mercenaries) (45 page)

Walter went pale. “I can’t. I can’t give this information up to a government.”

“But you were willing to give it to the Internet?” It was time to point out a few things to the very naïve scientist. And it was also time to get out of sight. He nodded toward the memorial. The good news about a maze was everyone tended to get lost.

Carter entered first, hauling Walter along easily.

“If everyone has it, then we all have mutually assured destruction,” Walter said, his feet tripping slightly as they started on a downward slope.

“That might work when it’s two or three superpowers who have nuclear arms,” Damon explained. “I’m going to suspect this is easier to get hands on than uranium and a hell of a lot easier to deliver a payload. If you turn it over to a reporter and it gets out, every extremist group in the world will be cooking up smallpox and unleashing it on their enemies.”

“I guess I hadn’t thought of it that way. God, that sounds horrible. I still don’t think I should give it to the British, though. I’m an American.”

Damon moved carefully toward the other side. He caught a glimpse of something metallic and turned. A man was moving past, roughly ten rows down. He was holding a Ruger.

So the Germans were here. He would bet his life that man was German intelligence. The man disappeared behind the columns as he moved away.

Damon needed to hurry this along. Carter’s eyes had widened. He seemed to have caught the threat, too.

“Nothing is going to matter if we don’t get you out of here now. The Germans likely don’t want to hurt any of us. They don’t particularly want an international incident, but they aren’t bloody stupid. They can’t allow this information to fall into our hands any more than we can let it fall into theirs. We have one shot. We get to the embassy and then I’ll find a way to destroy it. No one should have it. No one.”

He would probably lose his job, but that didn’t sound so terrible anymore. He would try to play it off as incompetence and not a brutal lie.

Of course he had to get to the embassy first. “Do you have the package?”

Walter frowned, though he seemed to be walking on his own now. “Yeah.” He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a thumb drive. “I brought it with me. I kind of want to get rid of it altogether. I wish I’d never worked on it. It was a puzzle. I’ve never been able to turn down a puzzle.”

Damon didn’t care. He just wanted this whole thing over with so he could figure out what had happened with the communications.

“
Wir haben sie gefunden
,” a masculine voice shouted.

Damon turned to his right, and one of the German agents was moving their way.

“Let’s go,” he said. He ran forward, turning to the right and then the left.

“We can’t get lost in here if we stay together and we bloody well need to get lost,” Carter said. “Give him the package.”

Walter’s eyes widened. “You really trust him?”

“I trust the man he’s with and he tells me to trust this bloke. I also think his girl would kick his arse if he didn’t do the right thing.” Carter put his back against one of the slabs. “We need to split up. There are two things they want. They want the package and they want what made the package. It’s still in Walt’s head.”

“Shit.” Walt’s hands shook as he passed the thumb drive over. “I wish I never did this.”

Scientists had been saying that since they realized their work could be used for mass destruction. They still did it. Damon grabbed the thumb drive. The lives of thousands, maybe millions, were on that drive, and he had to figure out a way to destroy it. He and Taggart had decided hiding it wasn’t good enough. They could hide Walter, but the physical information had to be destroyed.

“
Halt!
” A tall man started running toward them.

There wasn’t time to debate.

“Get to the embassy if you can or somewhere safe. He needs to disappear.” Damon moved again, running into a tourist and forcing his way by. Maybe if they split up the Germans, their odds would increase.

He needed to find Taggart, needed to know Jesse had made it to the suite and everything was fine.

He also had to hope German intelligence wanted to keep this as quiet as the rest of them or there would be a line of cops waiting for him when he hit the street and started for the embassy. He jogged, the world a gray blur on either side of him.

And then his comm came back online. “Hello, Damon.”

Baz. He would know the voice anywhere.

He stopped, touching his comm so he could talk. “What the hell are you doing on this line?”

“Oh, I thought it was probably time to talk. After all we’ve got some business to do. You’re going to bring me the package and I’m going to trade for something you like.”

His blood went cold. “What?”

“Oh, my gorgeous boy. I think you know.”

He did. Baz had Penny, and he was out of options.

* * * *

Penny closed her eyes against the bright light of day as she was pulled out of the van Baz had shoved her in.

“Do you remember what our deal is, love?” Baz asked, his voice silky and smooth. He was dressed for the occasion in slacks and a sport coat, his eyes hidden behind a pair of aviators.

She forced herself to nod. She’d come quietly because he’d been willing to not put bullets in the unconscious team members’ heads. “I do.”

“Excellent. Because I have friends who can finish the job if I call them. I actually feel a bit sick that I didn’t take the chance and off Weston. I always hated that bastard. So far above the rest of us.”

“The waiters.”

“What?” Baz shook his head and then it cleared. “Yes, of course. The waiters.” He stepped behind her. “Of course I could always just shoot you, but I think Damon wants you warm.”

She had no doubt that Baz would prefer to murder her in front of Damon.

Baz shoved her a little. “You better hope that your lover isn’t lying about having the package.”

“You better hope that the German intelligence agents aren’t waiting for you.” She stumbled but managed to keep on her feet.

“What are you talking about?”

He didn’t know? The word about Champion had always been that he could be hyper focused to the point that he missed things he shouldn’t. He tended to work alone. He might not know.

“Nothing.” She wasn’t going to hand him information. “I’m sure if Damon says he has the package that he has it.”

“He better.” He looked back into the van at the woman who was driving. “Stay here. You don’t want to cross me. I got you that job. I can take it away, and you won’t like how I get you fired.”

Candice, the turncoat traitor who hopefully would die horribly, nodded. “I get it. Just please hurry. I don’t know how long I can keep the van here.”

“You’ll keep it here as long as I need you to, bitch.” Baz shook his head. “Good help really is hard to find these days.”

“Or it could be no one wants to work with you.” It had been that way at SIS. Only Damon had been able to really stand the man, and now she understood why. Damon held himself apart because he believed everyone would leave him one way or another. Baz had offered him company, but Damon hadn’t been emotionally involved. It had been the best relationship he could manage.

“No one can keep up with me. Move.” He gripped her elbow, forcing her to walk beside him.

She couldn’t forget about that gun in his coat. And there was a possibility that she was wrong about the waiters. If they really did belong to Baz, he could still make good on his threat. She had to do everything she could to keep her people alive.

How quickly they’d become her people. A few short days and she knew she would care about them forever.

“Damon could keep up with you.” For some reason she wanted him talking. Baz seemed to love to talk. Even if he was insulting her, he wasn’t fully thinking about what was about to happen. She needed to keep him engaged. He was moving toward what looked like a forest of cement slabs. The Holocaust Memorial.

If she could get away from him in there, she might have a chance, but she had to find Damon first.

If she ran, what would happen to her friends?

“We’re meeting him in the south corner. And he certainly can’t keep up with me now. I saw to that. Poor Damon with his damaged heart. It’s rather fitting, actually. He’s always had a metaphorical one. I just made it real.” He stopped in front of a bench. “Sit here.”

She sat on the bench, Baz firmly behind her with a hand close to her throat. She was sure they looked somewhat affectionate. Just two tourists enjoying the beauty of Berlin.

“Damon, you’re not here,” Baz said into his device.

She couldn’t see him, but she knew he would be touching the device in his ear, the one he’d taken off Simon’s unconscious body. “I guess you don’t want her. Well, I wouldn’t either. She’s a bit chunky. Look, you don’t have to take the girl. I’ll pay you well. My employers are willing to write you a check. And you know I’d be more than happy to get rid of her for you. It would be my pleasure.”

Damon walked out from between the slabs, moving with none of his normal grace. His chest was working, moving up and down as he forced his lungs to take in oxygen.

“Oh, look, you ran. You know, I remember a time when you could run for hours and I wouldn’t even be able to tell. You were so fit, so young.” Baz’s voice lowered, taking on the intimate tones of a lover.

Damon didn’t look at him, his eyes steady on her. “Are you all right, love?”

Penny nodded. Just being in the same space with him, seeing that he was alive and whole, brought a calm to her she hadn’t possessed before. “Yes. I’m fine. Damon, you can’t give it to him. You know that, right?”

Damon’s face softened. “You’re telling me what I can’t do again. It’s a pattern with you.”

She could see people moving through the columns of concrete in the memorial. She caught flashes of them as they walked through. Why couldn’t anyone see that something terrible was happening under their noses?

“Do you have the package?” Baz asked.

Damon nodded.

She had to stop him. There would be far too many lives at risk if The Collective got their hands on that information again. “Damon, don’t give it to him. Get out of here.”

He could lose himself in that maze. It would be so easy. Even now she saw little splashes of color as someone ran by and then disappeared again.

“But if I leave he’ll kill you.” Damon was perfectly calm, as though they were discussing dinner plans and not the possible fate of the world.

She needed to remind him what was at stake. “And if you give him that information, thousands will die. You know what they’re planning. You have to sacrifice me. You have to. This is a choice between one woman and the world. There is no choice.”

“You’re right. There is no choice.” He held up a small thumb drive dangling from the end of a lanyard. “You are my world, love.”

Her heart cried out for him, but she shook her head. “No, Damon.”

She wanted him to survive, couldn’t stand the thought of living in a world without him, but she couldn’t trade her freedom when it meant the deaths of so many others.

Where was Ian Taggart? Where was the rest of the team?

Baz’s hand tightened on her shoulder to almost the point of pain. “Well, isn’t that touching? It actually makes me sick.”

“I don’t care what it does to you, Baz,” Damon replied. “If you want this, you’ll let her go.”

“How do I know that’s got anything at all on it? That could be a blank drive. I’m afraid I’m going to need more than your word. Where is Walter Bennett?”

Damon shook his head. “He’s long gone, and you won’t find him again.”

“That is a tragedy. I was so looking forward to spending time with him.”

“It’s not going to happen. You can take the package or you’ll have nothing to give your bosses.” Damon gripped the drive in his palm, shielding it from view. “I’ll go with you, Baz. Take me instead of her. I’m the one you want.”

She didn’t even try to stop the tears now. “No.”

“Shut up.” Baz let her feel the barrel of his gun against her back. “If you say another word, I’ll do you right here in front of him.”

Now Damon wasn’t looking at her. He was focused on the man behind her, and she could feel his will. “I know you have a way out of here. You likely have some way to drug me. I’ll submit to all of it if you let her go.”

“And what if what I really want is for you to submit to me completely?” The question came out in a menacing purr.

Penny felt her fists clench at the thought of her Damon bowing down to this man. He was proud. Sometimes his pride had been all he had to hold on to in the world. He couldn’t give himself over.

“Then I’ll call you Master,” Damon replied evenly. “If you want, Basil, I’ll be your dog. That is what you want, right?”

“You can’t imagine what I want from you.”

She saw him then. The man who had brought the tea. He’d ditched the waiter outfit and now he stalked closer. She had to strain, but she heard him call out.

“Ich habe ihn. Komm schnell. Der Brite ist in Schwierigkeiten.”

Translation.
I have him. Come quickly. The Brit is in trouble.

She’d thought they brought the drugged tea, but what if they had just been scouting? Candice had drugged the tea. Baz was bluffing. He didn’t have anyone else. Her friends were safe and the German agents were about to cause some serious problems for them.

What they needed was a bit of chaos.

Penny gritted her teeth and prayed she could survive the next few moments.

* * * *

Damon tried not to think about how frightened Penelope must be. In a few moments, she would be free and once she was out of the line of fire, he would do whatever he had to do.

Though he rather hoped Taggart would choose to show up sometime soon.

He’d meant every word he said. He would do anything to save Penelope, including giving up the package, but he hoped he didn’t have to.

Another bloody gift she’d given him. Hope. He never used to have it. It was so much better to see the world through Penelope’s eyes than his own.