Free Gone Cold by Douglas Corleone Page B

were at the Old Soak a few minutes earlier. And that afforded me options.
    Slowly, I raised my hands in the air. Spoke the first words in the first language that popped into my head.
    “ Je ne comprends pas, ” I said as innocently as possible . “ Parlez-vous français? ”
    The one with the metal pipe said, “Are you taking the piss?”
    “Naw,” the gunman said, shaking his head. “He’s a bloody frog, isn’t he? A feckin’ cheese-eating surrender monkey.”
    The sound of the second vehicle was growing closer. If it was Ashdown, the situation would come under control. I just needed to buy a few extra seconds.
    But before I could say another word, the driver of the green SUV shouted from his window: “Ewan, I think the bastart chucked the Chairman’s boy into the rubbish.”
    The one with the metal pipe seemed to consider his options. Then he nodded to the gunman, who spun toward the Dumpster.
    As the gunman raised the .45 and took aim at Gilchrist’s hiding spot, I charged at him.
    Spotting me in his periphery, the gunman held his fire and swung the weapon in my direction.
    In that instant I was as large and as vulnerable a target as I could be. My only hope was to reach the handgun before he squeezed the trigger.
    Desperately, I swiped at the air in front of me. Felt the metal of the muzzle beneath the fingers on my left hand and squeezed it tightly, guiding it to the side as I did.
    The gun went off.
    A hot blast scorched my palm.
    Using my momentum, I threw my right hand up near my shoulder blade and raised my elbow in an uppercut that connected with the gunman’s chin. His head snapped back, harder and faster than the one I’d head-butted back at the pub.
    He dropped flat on his back and didn’t move.
    Meanwhile, the one with the pipe slumped forward, clutching his stomach.
    I remained still as the pipe clanged against the blacktop, the sound echoing off the brick walls like a church bell.
    I looked down at the gunman, who lay at my feet. He was conscious but barely. Muttering something about Inverness, the kid had no clue as to where he was.
    The driver of the SUV sat slack-jawed, his eyes flicking from me to his fallen friends and back. Then finally settling on the good-looking kid who’d been carrying the pipe.
    Following his gaze, I locked on the moaning, groaning form as he tried to slither in one direction and then another, all to no avail.
    In the black of the alley, it was difficult to tell, but he appeared to have taken a gut shot. One from which he wouldn’t recover.
    In the next few moments, several things happened at once. The driver of the green SUV finally gathered his nerve and jumped out of his vehicle. He looked more like the kid with bad skin than the one who was dying.
    I remained frozen as the driver reached into his jacket and drew a second handgun. Another HK .45, which he immediately trained on me.
    The squeal of tires from behind him caused him to turn just in time to see Ashdown’s Nissan crossover skid to a stop, effectively blocking the SUV from any chance of escape.
    The gunman swung his weapon around. But Ashdown was already out of his vehicle, aiming his Glock 17, and shouting for the driver to drop the weapon and get to his knees.
    The driver followed Ashdown’s instructions.
    “You all right, Simon?” Ashdown called out without looking at me.
    Before I could answer we heard the bleating of sirens. Maybe as close as three or four blocks away.
    “We need to get the hell out of here,” I said, already moving toward the Dumpster.
    Ashdown said, “Am I to take it that this would be a bitch to explain?”
    I said, “Unless we want to spend the next seventy-two hours in a holding cell, we’re not even going to try.”
    I lifted the lid of the Dumpster. A hand gripping a switchblade materialized out of the rubbish and took a swipe at me, slicing my left palm.
    I swallowed the scream forming in the rear of my throat.
    As I drew back, the knife and hand vanished into the