Gates of Hades Read Online Free PDF Page B

and the door swung an inch or so.
    He turned to Paco. “You got that syringe ready?”
    Paco held up a SIG Sauer like Jason’s. “Yeah, but I’m cocked an’ locked.”
    The two men crept up a dimly lit companionway to the middle level of the vessel. At the top of the stairs a door led to a passageway that resembled the hall of a plush apartment building more than anything nautical. Thick carpet covered floors bounded by highly polished teak walls.
    â€œLast door on the left,” Jason whispered.
    Paco, weapon ready, watched Jason make his way to the end. Jason stood outside the door covering Paco until he, too, stood outside it. Jason held up one finger, then a second. On the third, he opened the door and entered while Paco stood ready to supply covering fire if needed.
    The only light in the stateroom seeped through half-curtained portholes from the late-night bars along the dock. Paco slipped inside and softly closed the door. A muffled click announced that he had locked it. Both men flattened themselves against the bulkhead while their eyes became accustomed to what illumination there was. The sound of light snoring came from a bed that was a dark blob to their right. Jason was beside it in two steps, his gun ready when Paco flipped the light switch.
    Both occupants of the bed came immediately awake.
    Jason jammed the stubby barrel of his gun into the man’s gaping mouth. “One sound and your brains’ll be all over those silk sheets,” he whispered.
    Jason saw that the other body was that of a woman, no doubt an advance on Alazar’s ration of heavenly virgins. She emitted a squeak of terror as Paco placed his weapon next to her head and made a quiet shushing sound. Her eyes darted from the gun to the syringe he held in his other hand and back again.
    Jason gave a quick nod, and Paco pulled the woman from the protection of the bedclothes. She was nude. He roughly shoved her toward the adjacent bath.
    â€œYou shut up,” Paco cautioned. “I hear anythin’ from you, and you dead.”
    From the expression on her face before Paco closed the door, she believed him.
    Jason was counting on the fact that, unlike many of his cllients, Alazar had no desire to meet Allah up close and personal just yet.
    Alazar lay perfectly still, only a twitch of his eyes betraying his fear. Jason followed the direction in which the arms dealer had glanced. Without removing the gun from the man’s mouth, Jason reached under a pillow and held up a .38 Beretta. He jammed it into the waist of his pants.
    â€œDon’t even think about it,” he said as he held out a hand toward Paco.
    Paco slapped the syringe into his palm.
    Alazar began to squirm, a series of unintelligible protests leaking around the gun’s muzzle.
    Jason held the needle up, squeezing a few drops from the end to make sure there were no air bubbles.
    â€œHold still,” he hissed. “If I were going to kill you, you’d be dead. You’re going for a ride, and we want to make sure you don’t become a party pooper on us.”
    He stuck the syringe into an arm.
    Jason had not emptied the needle before Alazar’s back arched. Teeth ground against the gun’s barrel as the man’s face contorted and spasmed. His arms flailed widely; then he moaned and was still. Dropping the syringe, Jason felt the neck for a pulse at the carotid artery. There was none. Blank eyes stared into eternity. As if he needed confirmation of the obvious, there was the smell of the result a recently relaxed sphincter muscle.
    â€œShit!” Jason spit. “There goes our security blanket. Some asshole overcooked the tranquilizer.” He flung the syringe across the room. “Stupid bastards!”
    Paco was puzzled. “Now what?”
    Jason glanced around the stateroom. “Go through the bureau there; see if you can find papers, anything of interest.”
    As he spoke, Jason snatched a laptop