Knaves (19 page)

While the two men struggled, Valmont’s punches and kicks full of vicious anger but no match for the sheer will of Hayden’s blows, Karla felt something move past her. Yanking her hands against her bonds, she looked up at Latour whose face was fixed grimly on the fighting men. There was a cut above his left eye.

“
Hayden!” she screamed.

Pausing only to hit Valmont once again with such force that he stunned the Marquis, Hayden dragged himself to his feet. Against any other man he would have been powerful and intimidating, but compared to the silent, terrible Goliath he was a fierce but outmatched David. That didn
’t stop him, however. With a roar he launched himself forward and, more by luck than skill, caught Latour in his midriff so that both of them fell backwards.

They were behind her now, and Karla could only hear the sound of violent scuffles and punches mixed with Hayden
’s grunts and a weird, moaning noise that she assumed came from Latour. Her wrists and ankles were burning as they chafed against the leather straps, but she ignored the pain and tried to pull herself free, becoming even more frantic as Valmont lifted himself from the floor. His one eye was already beginning to swell, bruises turning his once handsome face into a mockery of its former self, and he swayed slightly on his feet.

After regarding the two men fighting for a moment, he paused only to bend down and lift something up. When he walked towards Karla, his hand briefly hidden behind his back, she resumed her desperate struggle but was unable to resist him when he grabbed hold of her hair and yanked back her head. She felt something cold against her throat.

“Monsieur Rider,” she heard him say, his breath coming in short bursts. “I should congratulate you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone handle themselves so well against Latour. However, I should warn you that if you don’t stop this minute, I shall not hesitate to slit her throat.”

At this, she heard the fighting stop behind her.

“No!” she yelled. “Hayden, don’t do it! He’s bluffing!” At this, Valmont’s grip tightened in her hair and he laughed.

“
Let her go,” she heard Hayden snarl. “You bastard! I’ll kill you!”

“
You’re in no position to threaten me, not now. Latour, use that rope—over there.”

Valmont released her and Karla strained her head around to see Hayden on the other side of the room, sullenly watching the pair of them as Latour bound his hands behind his back. His eyes were suffused with pain and suffering when he saw Karla
’s face, and with a roar he suddenly launched forward, as though he were going to ram into the Marquis. Without a moment’s hesitation Latour punched him solidly in the side of his head, causing him to stagger to his knees. A sob escaped Karla’s lips.

“
Very good, very good, Monsieur Rider,” Valmont purred. “Actually, this works very well. In some ways you have interrupted my prospects of breaking this bitch, but you’ll be my insurance. When you see the pretty ways I hurt her, how I use her again and again until she can’t stand it anymore, you’ll be ready to tell me everything I want to know.”

Karla saw Hayden shake away his dizziness and slowly lift his face. He spat blood from his mouth and stared past her.
“I’ll tell you anything you want,” he said quietly. “Just let her go.”

“
There’ll be no need to say another word,” another voice interrupted them. “You know what they say—loose talk cost lives.” Karla’s heart leaped up inside her as she recognised it.

“
Who the hell are you?” she heard Valmont yell.

“
That’s none of your fecking business,” Coilin replied. “But I’ll tell you this, as a lifelong republican I don’t take kindly to some shite-nosed aristocrat abusing my niece.”

Hayden
’s head was a terrible Technicolor cinema as he slowly revived consciousness, an oversaturated vision of the world around him accompanied by some dreadful, pulsing soundtrack that roared in his ears and throbbed throughout his skull.

It took him several minutes to realise that he was being dragged by his arms, a security guard on either side, and he fought his own impulse to struggle against them. In this position it would be far too difficult to succeed and they
’d be just as likely to club him unconscious again.

That was one of the hardest things he
’d ever done: inside him, a terrible rage was flooding through him as he remembered what that bastard had done. Karla! he yelled silently, grinding his jaws together, his thoughts murderous and vicious. Nonetheless, he maintained an iron grip over his self-control. All that fury would do him no good, not yet.

Instead he forced his mind to become cool and focussed. Valmont had knocked Karla unconscious
—a glimmer of hatred forced itself through the icy rationalisation but Hayden pushed it away. That could find satisfaction later: for now he had to think. It was unlikely that the Marquis would remain in Monaco. If he’d ever intended to, that would all change once he realised what had happened to his wealth. Their task had been to keep Valmont busy while Toby got to work in London, setting in motion a run on certain very risky but very high value assets and futures: in the great scheme of things, a tiny drop in the vast ocean of money had disappeared and a few fund managers would fail to get their bonuses that year. If all had gone according to plan, however, Valmont was due to become a much poorer man.

If. Hayden fought down a sense of sickness. Everything was too risky, and Karla should never have been the bait. She, however, had insisted: if anything, her determination to get the Marquis, to ruin Valmont, had pushed out every other consideration. While they had both known that Valmont was capable of terrible things, however, Hayden had never expected such quick and brutal violence against her.

His anger was starting to cloud his thinking and he forcibly repressed the terrible image of Karla falling to the floor even as his heart lurched in his chest. He had to think. Valmont would no longer be in Monaco but would have taken Karla somewhere else. The properties belonging to the Marquis that they knew of were too far away, which meant that it had to be de Tour. Hayden ignored the despair that threatened to overwhelm him, that they could be on their way to some secret hideout that he knew nothing about. It
had
to be de Tour.

He could still feel the weight of his keys and mobile in his pocket. The guards hadn
’t searched him yet, simply dragging him away to some holding room. They still thought he was unconscious and, as they dropped him to the floor he realised this was the time to act.

His eyes narrowed, he could just make out a figure standing over him, talking to the other guard in French. There was a clink of keys and Hayden took the chance that the second guard would be concentrating on the door. It was now or never.

Without warning, he lifted one foot rapidly and kicked with all his force into the chest of the man standing over him. Opening his eyes, he saw the guard’s face register a sudden panic but before he could cry out Hayden’s kick caused him to deflate, all the air forced from his lungs in a sigh as he collapsed.

The other guard turned in astonishment, his keys dropping to the floor as he fumbled for the holster at his side. Hayden was in a precarious position down on the
ground, but he still had the advantage of surprise. Flinging his body sideways, his foot swept the guard’s legs from beneath him and, as the man fell to the floor, Hayden rolled forwards and grabbed him punching him once, twice to the side of the head. The guard barely made a sound as he slumped unconscious.

The other one was struggling to push himself up now and Hayden turned his attention to him. If he
’d used his fists, he might have stood a chance, but again he was trying to release the flap on his holster when Hayden grabbed his head and banged it hard against the wall. The whole event had probably taken less than thirty seconds and Hayden was now up and running away as fast as he could.

He felt sick as he ran. He hated violence and during his long career of scams and crimes had avoided it as much as possible. Yet he also felt a terrible adrenaline rushing through his veins, partly caused by fear but also by excitement. It was all too easy, he realised, to get your kicks from hurting other people. No doubt that was why Valmont enjoyed it so much.

But he had no time for such considerations. All that mattered now was getting to Karla as quickly as possible before that bastard could hurt her.

He
’d committed as much of the plans of the casino as he could to memory. At the Chateau de Tour he’d been out of his element, too easily confused and overwhelmed by the place, and he was determined not to let that happen again. Although he couldn’t be entirely sure of his position now, he also knew that a number of service entrances and corridors ran throughout the building. All he had to do was find one and make his way to the underground car park before the police thought to search them.

Pushing through a door, he was relieved to see that the stairwell was deserted. With his back pressed to the door, he fished out his phone and hastily called up Karla
’s number. It went to voice mail which didn’t surprise him and instead he opened a map, waiting for GPS to find his location. At least the signal was blocked in only part of the building, and within seconds he knew where to go.

He tried to keep a steady pace as he ran down stairs and along corridors, ducking back whenever he heard someone coming towards him, resisting the urge to rush headlong into them. The most important thing was to get out of the building as quickly as possible. At last he opened a door that led into the cool, dimly lit space of the parking lot and, as he loped along, he reached into his pocket and retrieved his key.

Their car was a Jaguar F-Type S, a silvery blue two-seater that Karla had insisted they hire as part of the playboy image of Sebastian Rider. That made Hayden scowl. Sebastian no longer existed: he’d been erased the moment he saw Valmont hit Karla. Hayden had no doubts at all as to who he was and what he wanted more than anything else in the world.

Jumping into the seat, he didn
’t even bother with his seat belt as he started the engine and gunned the vehicle into reverse. The wheels screeched beneath him and he swerved the car around, slamming his foot down on the accelerator and making the V6 engine throb as it shot forward.

He had just enough sense to push the car fast enough to get out of Monte Carlo without attracting too much attention: the last thing he needed now was a high speed car chase through the city, but once he was on the road that led north he floored the accelerator and raced along as fast as the Jaguar would go, dark shadows whipping along beside him as he swerved easily past the few vehicles heading into the Provençal countryside.

That journey to Chateau de Tour was one of the longest that Hayden had ever experienced. As he sped along the roads winding through the mountains, rarely dropping below a hundred miles an hour and often pushing the car much faster, he had to ignore the despair and guilt that threatened him constantly and instead concentrate on mastering the Jag as it roared through the night. All this was his fault, he knew it: it was his fault that Karla had been introduced to Valmont, his fault that they had entered the diseased and decadent world of de Tour, his fault that now she had let herself be used to try and ruin the Marquis and been taken from him. He almost sobbed at that. Taken from him! There was nothing he wouldn’t do to get her back, and if that sick bastard had harmed a single hair on her head Hayden knew that he would do his utmost to kill the Marquis.

At last he came to the chateau, flinging the car along the long drive that led to the house and barely waiting for it to screech to a halt before he leaped out of the vehicle. As he ran towards the entrance one of Valmont
’s servants gaped at him in surprise and began shouting in French, but Hayden shoved him to one side and ran at full speed through the rooms. If Karla was here he knew exactly where the Marquis would have taken her.

Some of the servants scattered out of his way as he pelted along at full speed, but when he entered the room where poor Eloise had unwillingly shown him the door to the old tower, one man grabbed hold of Hayden, yelling loudly as he gripped onto the intruder
’s arm. Hayden lifted his fist but, as he looked down at his opponent, a slightly frail man in his fifties at least, he felt sickened at himself. With a curse he simply pushed with his hand brusquely, causing the other man to fall backwards onto the soft furnishings that littered the room.

Before he could consider how he was going to break through the heavily carved door, he had the satisfaction of seeing it begin to open. Well, that was one problem solved at least. Then his heart sank.

Though the doorway was considerably larger than many others, Latour had to duck slightly as he came through it, his broad shoulders filling the entrance. There was that impression of irregular, misplaced lumps beneath the manservant’s jacket, of muscles that were too big and in the wrong place, and his twisted face regarded Hayden with a mixture of anger and amusement, as though looking forward to swatting an annoying fly.

With a gulp, Hayden realised that this was no time to exercise discretion as the better part of valour. Roaring in an attempt to steel his nerves, he rushed forward to try and throw the gigantic opponent off balance.

Latour’s blow was slow, almost lazy, a massive sidewinder that swung through the air and smashed into Hayden’s back as he bent down to try and crash into his enemy. Had it connected with Hayden’s head it would have knocked him out, but as it was it sent him tumbling to the floor and Latour ambled forward, reaching out with huge plates of hands to grab the smaller, muscular man.

Rolling to one side, Hayden scrabbled away in an undignified fashion. He had to get past Latour somehow and, in desperation, he grabbed hold of an oriental vase in his hand. Latour
’s eyes widened slightly as he saw it—no doubt some precious objet d’art belonging to generations of Valmont’s treacherous family—and Hayden saw his opportunity, flinging it towards the giant’s head. Too late Latour lifted his hands and it crashed into his face, smashing into fragments and cutting his brow.

As Latour fumbled, Hayden saw his chance. Darting to one side, he rushed through the door into a cold, stone stairwell beyond. There was no key in the lock but Hayde dropped an old wooden bar across the latch: he wasn
’t sure how long that would hold Valmont’s servant, but he had no time to consider other options as he turned and bounded up the worn flag steps leading above.

The room he entered was grim and forbidding, but what stopped Hayden was the even grimmer sight that lay before him.

On some sort of bench or horse which he vaguely recognised from the video he’d glimpsed, Karla was strapped by her wrists and ankles. Her dress had been torn from her back and hung in tatters, and though he felt sick at the sight of her bound this way at least he could see from her skin that Valmont had not yet begun his degenerate work on her. He couldn’t see her face, hidden as it was by the Marquis who was bending in front of her, his back to Hayden as he said something in a low voice, but her whimpers of fear were unmistakable.

Hayden had paused only for a second to take all this in and now he bent his head down, arms spread wide as he ran full tilt into the Marquis, throwing all his weight into the tackle so that the two of them went down, crashing into a table on which whips and various other implements had been laid. The wooden board collapsed beneath them and Hayden lifted his hands, throwing in two hard, solid punches before Valmont recovered from his surprise and began to fight back. Trying to stand, something tangled around Hayden
’s legs and he fell, though he managed to pull Valmont back on top of him.

All he could think of at that moment was his hatred towards the Marquis, blind fury that drove his fists, knocking Valmont almost senseless. When Karla screamed his name, however, he looked up at her face, bruised and full of terror, then past her to where Latour stood at the other end of the room.

Hayden was desperate now. All he could think of was the dreadful necessity to get Karla away from that place. His own safety meant nothing to him and, staggering to his feet, he gave a terrible shout and ran straight into the giant, catching him off balance so that both of them tumbled to the floor. Hayden was faster, pummelling into Latour with his fists in swift succession, but whenever the servant landed a blow it stunned Hayden so that he gasped in pain.

Nonetheless he ignored the agony. He had to win
—he
had
to. Karla’s safety, perhaps her life, depended on it and nothing else mattered now. And though each assault the giant made caused his head to spin, his body to shriek in agony, he had the satisfaction of seeing a look of fear in Latour’s eyes as he continued his relentless fight. Latour was making some weird, moaning noise, but above this Hayden suddenly heard Valmont’s voice.

“
Monsieur Rider, I should congratulate you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone handle themselves so well against Latour. However, I should warn you that if you don’t stop this minute, I shall not hesitate to slit her throat.”