“I’m okay,” I whisper. “Get his radio.”
I strip the quad-tubes and the thermal module off the dead man’s helmet, pulling the unit over my own head. The world explodes into green phosphor. But over the green, there’s an orange outline—the thermal overlay.
I can see. The body cooling on the floor. Iris burning bright against the walls.
She’s kneeling by the body, fumbling with the tactical vest. Her hands are shaking, but she unclips the radio.
“Take the earpiece,” I tell her. She hands it to me, and I shove it into my ear.
“Check in,” a voice says over the channel. “Echo Two, report.”
Russian. The accent is thick.
I press the transmit button. “Kitchen clear,” I grunt in fluent, breathless Russian.
There’s a pause.
“Copy,” the voice says. “Stack up on the main study. They have a barricade.”
They bought it. For now.
“We have the advantage,” I say, leading Iris forward. “They think we’re downstairs.”
“Where are we going?”
“The study. Varro is holding it. It’s the only defensible position left.”
I grab the dead man’s rifle. It’s an HK416, with the suppressor still tightly threaded on the barrel. Good weapon. On the side rail is a pressure switch for the weapon light.
I hand my pistol to Iris.
“Take this.”
She stares at it. “I have the knife.”
“A knife is for when you’re cornered. This is for keeping them away.” I point to the switch on the side of the pistol. “That’s the light. Don’t turn it on until you see a target. If you use it, you reveal yourself. Thumb the switch only when you mean to kill.”
She takes the gun. It’s huge in her hands.
“Okay,” she whispers.
“Stay close.”
I step over the body and move into the kitchen.
Through the NVGs, the house is a landscape of ghosts. Faint heat blooms on the door handles where the team passedthrough, the cold draft blowing in from the shattered French doors in the dining room.
We move through the kitchen and into the main hallway.
The Great Hall is a war zone.
The furniture is overturned. There are bullet holes in the plaster. The smell of cordite is thick.
I scan the upper balcony. Clear.
The same can’t be said about the front entrance. The front doors have been blown off their hinges, letting the storm pour into the foyer.
Two tangos are stacked by the study doors, trying to wedge a pry bar into the reinforced frame. They’re trying to flush Varro out.
