wheeled, unholstering a pistol and leveling it at the doorway in the rear of the hut. The plank door hung askew on crooked hinges. Grant threw himself against the wall, putting his Copperhead against his right shoulder. In almost the same shaved fraction of a second, the door crashed open and three men staggered into the hut.
Chapter 2
They were small, fierce Malaysians, all of them adorned in little more than rags. They carried a variety of pistols and carbines. The tallest man, who stood five foot eight, stared at Grant and Kane in astonishment.
A purple silk scarf enwrapped the Malaysian’s forehead, and gold earrings glittered in the lobes of both ears. His face and hands were covered by a network of old scar tracings. A scraggly mustache twisted down around the sides of his mouth, which was open in surprise.
For a long moment no one moved or spoke. Then the man in the purple scarf demanded in passably good English, “Where the fuck did you two come from?”
“Montana,” Kane replied, striving to sound nonchalant. “What about you?”
The man ignored Kane’s question. “You’re not part of Captain Saragayn’s crew. I know all of them.”
“Are you one of his crew?” Grant asked.
The man’s face convulsed with anger. “You don’t know who I am?”
“Should we?” Kane inquired.
The man tapped his chest with a thumb. “I’m Mersano.” The little Malaysian said the name as if it would explain everything.
Kane pointed to himself and Grant. “I’m Kane. This is Grant. We’re trying to find a friend of ours. We got separated when the fighting broke out.”
Mersano’s eyebrows rose. “A friend? A woman?”
Before Kane could reply, a grenade exploded with a muffled crump, blowing a blast of muck and rock fragments in through the hole in the wall. A brief burst of gunfire followed the detonation, and a bullet chipped stone out of the wall beside Grant’s right shoulder. Everyone dropped flat to the floor as three more rounds struck the wall and keened away.
“Their grenade fell short but they’ll try again,” Mersano said angrily.
“Who will?” Grant demanded. “What the hell is going on here?”
Mersano gestured toward the gap in the front of the building. “Captain Saragayn’s crew is trying to kill me and my men.”
“Why?” Kane asked.
“Because me and some others tried to boot him out of office,” Mersano answered, raising his head and gazing at the darkness beyond the hole. “I think you two ought to throw in with us.”
“Good call,” Kane commented dryly, turning and aiming his pistol through the gap. He squeezed off a single shot, the Bren Ten slamming like a door.
Immediately a volley of bullets stormed in, ricocheting and chipping out fragments of stone. Kane counted at least four separate muzzle-flashes.
“They’ve got us pinned down,” Grant said. “They’ll chuck in more grens once they can get closer.”
Mersano chuckled, a harsh, bitter sound. He heaved himself to one knee. “Then it’s best not to linger.”
Kane cast him a questioning glance. “Do you know of a way out of here?”
Mersano thumbed back the hammer of the big Casull revolver he carried and spoke to his two men in a dialect that neither Grant nor Kane understood. His men nodded in understanding and readied their carbines. Thunder rolled and lightning flared.
“What’s the escape route?” Grant asked impatiently.
Mersano sprang to his feet. “Through the hole.”
He leaped through the cavity, landing in the mud outside. He crouched, eyes and gun barrel questing for targets. No one shot at him. Over his shoulder, he said quietly, “The captain’s men are circling around behind us. No one is paying much attention to the front.”
“Define ‘much attention,’” Kane demanded.
Mersano’s men jumped through the hole in the wall, joining their chief outside. Kane and Grant exchanged glances of weary resignation and then followed the men. They swept the perimeter with watchful gazes. The rain slackened as the heart of the storm moved farther inland.
Their eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, and Mersano gestured for everyone to follow him. “Move! Bergerak! Move!”
As the group of men sprinted across an open expanse of ground, a barrage of gunfire blazed from the interior of the hut. Voices rose in cries of outrage. Geysers of mud spewed up around them as bullets plowed into the ground.
Kane half turned to return the fire. Then he glimpsed a small projectile lancing overhead, seemingly propelled by a ribbon of spark-shot smoke. It arrowed through the gap in the wall of the hut. The interior instantly lit up with an orange nova of flame, surrounded by a dark mushroom of muck. The explosion slammed against his eardrums. The roof lifted up and one wall collapsed outward.
Kane returned his focus to running through the rain over uncertain ground.
“Don’t shoot! It’s me!” Mersano shouted.
The group ran into a narrow alley formed by several stacks of shipping crates. A tall figure in a hooded rain cape cradling a short-barreled, big-bored LAW rocket launcher stepped out of the shadows to meet them.
“Clarise!” Mersano shouted, showing his discolored teeth in a grin. “I was getting worried about you.”
“I was delayed,” said a soft female voice touched by a French accent. “A thousand pardons.”
Clarise pulled back the hood, revealing a face of surprisingly exotic beauty. She was a tall woman with skin the color of ivory, deep blue eyes and an athletic body with full, proud breasts and strong hips. Her long blond hair glittered with a patina of raindrops.
Clarise cast her suspicious gaze toward Kane and Grant. They met it with neutral expressions. “I don’t believe we’ve met,” she said.
Mersano nodded toward the two men. “Grant and Kane. From Montana.”
Clarise’s eyebrows rose. “Ah. The Americans from Cerberus who’ve been trying to unite Roamer, robber, Farer and freebooter against a common foe.”
“Yeah, that sounds like us,” Grant said blandly. “How did you know that?”
“I have my sources,” Clarise replied. “How’s that job working out for you?”
“Not so bad in some places, terrible in others,” Kane answered. “Like Pandakar, for example.”
Clarise laughed, but it sounded forced. “If you’d only delayed your arrival by a day or two, your reception would have been quite different. As it is, your timing for a diplomatic effort could not have been worse if you had planned it that way.”
Grant
