Blackout (Sam Archer 3) (32 page)

'My men will find them,' he said. ‘They don’t know about this place.’

There was a pause. Behind her, he looked out across the lawns and into the trees beyond.

'When will it be over?' she asked.

'When we arrest them. We already have one of them at the station.'

'These men won't just roll over and let you put the cuffs on, Tim. You said one of them killed himself before you could take him. And another committed suicide after he failed.'

'Then they'll all die. That's how it will end.'

'But who’s going to stop them?'

A long silence followed. She was right. They had never dealt with men like this before, highly- trained killers. His men were taught to arrest and question, to preserve life whenever possible, not shoot to kill and ask questions later. Whatever happened, this was going to end with more people being killed.

Possibly him.

His wife went to speak again, but she stopped.

'What?' Cobb asked her, feeling her tense up in his arms. 'What is it?'

She turned to him and frowned.

'Listen.'

Cobb listened. All he heard was the pattering of the rain against the window.

But then, he heard a faint sound.

It was a thumping, or a whining, a mix of both, faint amongst the rainfall but definitely audible.

He listened closer, as the noise grew stronger.

It sounded like a helicopter.

Cobb looked at his wife, her eyes wide with fear.

'Get the boys,' he said.

A hundred yards above them, Fox flew the helicopter over the main Hall then started to bring it down on the south-side of the house, the opposite side from where the Panthers would surely arrive on the only road in and out of the estate. Beside him, Porter, Chalky and Archer had all finished adjusting their throat mics and tac gear on the journey, reloading their weapons, and the three officers waited anxiously for the helicopter to land, eager to get on the ground. The house was still, and there was no sign of any vehicles. It looked
as if
they had beaten the Panthers here. During the flight, Chalky had gone to work on the wound on Archer’s head with a first-aid kit that the helicopter carried. Given the unpredictable movement of the vessel and Chalky not being known for his medical skills, Archer now sported a bandage wrapped three times around his head in a haphazard fashion, the bleeding stopped by gauze but the wound still throbbing and painful.

The helicopter touched down on the wet grass and before Fox could switch off the engine his three team-mates were already out of the doors, ducking low and running across the green lawn towards the house through the rain. Fox switched off the equipment and grabbing his MP5 from the foot-well, he secured the door behind him and sprinted across the soaked grass after the others, the rotors of the helicopter slowly coming to a halt behind him.

At a window, Cobb had the Glock in his hands, but had relaxed as he saw the black Unit helicopter touch down, and moved down the corridor to let his men in. He unlocked the door, pulling it open, and the men ran inside, fully armed, Fox catching up and joining them. The rain was starting to fall harder now and the men's wet boots slapped on the stone floor as they ran into the old house.

'What the hell’s going on?' Cobb asked, as Fox shut and locked the door behind him quickly. 'You're meant to be back at the station.'

‘They’re coming for you, sir,’ Porter said. ‘They know you’re here.’

‘What?’ Cobb said.

‘We need to secure the house.’

Cobb looked at them for a moment as realisation dawned, then nodded.

‘This way.’

He led the trio into the Drawing Room to their left. Cobb’s wife was standing waiting there with the two sleepy boys, looking worried.

‘What’s happening, Dad?’ the eldest boy asked, seeing the tension on his father’s face.

‘Is there a cellar?’ Fox asked. 'We need to get you all out of sight.'

‘Yes,' Cobb's wife said. 'But the-'

Before she could finish the sentence, all the lights went off.

The house
was
plunged into darkness, the only light from the moon shining in through the open windows.

Both Chalky and Fox swore simultaneously, their MP5s in their hands.

‘It’s OK,’ Cobb’s wife said. ‘The power has been cutting in and out recently. Old houses. Nothing to be worried about.’

'No,' Chalky said. ‘They’re here.’

He was right.

The Black Panthers were already in the house.

Rather than use the main drive and alert whoever was inside that they were coming, Spider and Bird had turned left once inside the gate and parked a hundred yards from the house in the woods, hiding the vehicles amongst the trees. The team had
collected
their kit and moved on to their target in the
gathering
darkness, the same routine they had carried out so many times in the past. None of them spoke, but all of them felt that same thrill that they had all those years ago, the squad out in the field again, hunting an enemy. They had stalked their way around the left side of the estate in the shadows, using the
shrubbery as cover. Second in the line behind Bird, who was on point, Wulf saw that the curtains to the Hall had been left open and
some
lights were on. In the moonlight, he could make out fresh tyre tracks on the driveway outside, slowly being washed away by the rain.

Cobb was here.

Under normal circumstances, the team would have liked to have infiltrated from above, through a roof light, but given how wet and slippery the walls were, scaling was impossible. They would have to go in from the ground. Start one side and sweep their way along.

The lock on the west door was old and big and easily picked by Bug, but as he worked on it, they had heard a helicopter approaching. Taking cover in the shadows, they had seen the chopper arrive and fly over the house,
ARU
printed on the side. Looking up at the vessel in the rain, Wulf silently cursed
the fact
he didn’t have an RPG. He could have taken the chopper out there and then. But it seemed some of these policemen couldn’t keep away.

They hadn't learnt their lesson from the police station.

Once Bug got the door open and the men moved inside the house, after a brief search Bird had located the big fuse-box in the cellar. He pulled the main switch and the entire Hall plunged into darkness. On cue, the men pulled down the visors of their night-vision goggles, their view of the house now tinged with green but clear as crystal through the lenses. They had also discarded the big and brash AK-47s for quieter weapons. Each man had a si
lenced MP5 SD3, the same weapon
as the police officers, only with an integrated suppressor on the end of each to hide muzzle flash effectively and make the weapon ideal for night-time operations. Although relatively heavy, weighing in at seven pounds alone without ammunition, the silenced sub-machine guns each held a 30-round magazine full of polished 9mm Parabellum bullets, two more clips on each man’s fatigues. The weapons guy down at the Docklands had outdone himself. Considering the weapons were illegal in the UK after a Firearms act banning all sub-machine guns, six of the MP5 SD3s with sufficient ammunition for four thousand pounds had been a very good deal. Given each man's training and experience, in the darkness the Panthers were damn good.

But with the night-vision goggles and such high-quality weapons, they were close to invincible.

Bird climbed the stairs from the cellar to join the others, pulling the door shut gently behind him. Wulf turned to his men, motioning a sequence of silent orders with his hands. They acknowledged and separated, the three of them moving off in separate
directions into the dark and silent Hall, their faces smeared with dark camo paint, dressed in black, brutal silenced sub-machine guns in their shoulders.

Alone, Wulf stood still for a moment, his eyes closed, tuning his senses, listening. Then he began to creep along the lower corridor, his dark boots printing mud on the floor. He felt his heart-rate rise with anticipation. Cobb was here somewhere. The last one of the group who had haunted his dreams every night for fifteen years in that prison. The last of the group whose intended death had given him a reason to stay alive. The men who had murdered his family, who had taken everything he had ever loved from him. Ten of them were now gone. And with this last execution, revenge and justice would be complete. He could die fulfilled and at peace.

Wulf moved through an open door silently and entered a long and quiet kitchen, the MP5 SD3 locked into his shoulder, a huge dark figure, an apparition, something out of a nightmare. Pots and pans hung from hooks along a long steel sink and table, gleaming silver in the fading moonlight from the windows and reflecting a distortion of the large black figure. He figured Cobb would be armed and his family may be here with him, but that would only sweeten the deal. Wulf would take his family just as he took his. An eye for an eye. A family for a family. Blood for blood. He felt his anticipation and excitement rise, but took a deep breath, gently loosening his grip on his silenced MP5.

The Hall was silent.

But it wasn't empty.

Cobb was here somewhere.

Wulf had been waiting fifteen years for this night.

With the MP5 SD3 as steady as a rock in his shoulder and his vision as clear as day through the goggles, the Albanian Special Forces commander moved off into the dark house, hunting his prey.

TWENTY NINE

In the drawing room, Fox had remained with Cobb and his family, his MP5 clutched in his hands. The power-cut meant they didn't have time to get to the cellar, the access to which was the other side of the house. Cobb had whispered that the fuse box was down there, so once the power went out they knew the Panthers would be coming in from that side. Porter and Chalky had left them in the Drawing Room, moving off into the large dark Hall, playing the deadliest possible game of hide and seek. Huddled behind a chaise-longue, Cobb's wife had her hands over her two boys’ mouths, who were crouched shivering in their pyjamas, terrified. Fox stood in front of the chaise-longue protectively, his MP5 locked and loaded, Jackson’s blood still on his overalls, Cobb beside him with the Glock, both men staring at the two separate doors that led into the room.

The Hall beyond was eerily silent. The only sound they could hear was the rain tapping against the glass. They waited, knowing there were other men in the house, hunting them, coming to kill them.

Outside the main door, there was a sudden noise. Very faint, but audible. There was a muffled whimper from one of the boys behind them in response.

Fox looked at Cobb, who nodded.

The ARU officer rose and crept towards the door slowly, his MP5 in his shoulder.

To his left, the curtains were open.

The moonlight illuminated the room with its cold light, breaking through the grey clouds as the falling rain continued to drum against the windows.

Suddenly, there was a smash, thud and a tinkle of glass.

Fox fell to the floor
, as the two boys gave muffled yelps under their mother's palms. Cobb dropped down too, his eyes raking the windows. Fox had dropped his MP5 and was clutching his leg, blood already pooling on the floor around him, a bullet deep in his left thigh.

Cobb belly-crawled along the floor to the wounded officer, his pistol in his hand. Fox's eyes were wide with shock and pain. Cobb could feel the warm blood on his stomach as he lay by the man. He pulled off his tie and wrapped a tight tourniquet around Fox's leg as best he could. Then he grabbed his officer's hand and dragged him back across the ground, making sure to stay low and out of view of the rifleman outside who had taken the shot

Upstairs, Spider was creeping along the corridor, his footfalls silent on the carpeted floor. He had just cleared two bedrooms, one by one, moving inside each, ready to shoot anyone inside, man, woman or child. He knew Cobb's family were here, but he would have no hesitation killing them too.

However, the two bedrooms had been empty. The sheets were disturbed however, recently used, the covers thrown back, the pillow imprinted with someone’s head. 

They were here.

Somewhere.

He stalked on. Glancing out of a window to his left, he saw the dark shape of the helicopter on the lawn. There were policemen here somewhere too. No matter. They were used to street arrests and broad daylight. The dark and the night were the Panthers' world. They would be irritations, only. With his night-vision goggles and his silenced MP5, his strength back after all those years in the prison, Spider felt invincible. Many men had tried to kill him before. None had succeeded. And tonight would be no different. English police officers were no match for him and the rest of the Panthers.

The door to the next room was ajar and Spider pushed it back gently with his toe, moving inside, checking left and right.

This room was different from the other two bedrooms. It had been rearranged, a cluster of chairs, stands and a desk gathered in the centre of the room away from the walls. The curtains were drawn but as he slowly checked out the room through his goggles he could see there were white sheets and blankets laid around the place, some cans of paint on the floor beside rollers and brushes, a paint-stained radio resting on a brown desk, plugged into a small generator on the ground. He saw that the room was being redecorated. Beside the paint cans and roller trays, he could make out the metallic sheen of some black floodlights, the reflector behind the dark bulbs silver and covered by long lens caps.