ASSASSINS HUNTED - An Eva Delacourt thriller

Rachel Amphlett

Description

"What would you do if your past came back to kill you? Eva Delacourt has been in hiding for three years after her fiancé was assassinated in cold blood outside the British embassy in Prague. She thought she was safe. But someone in the mysterious Section has betrayed her, and now she’s on the run for her life, sworn to protect the six-year old boy she adores. Her enemies are closing in, and the odds are not in Eva’s favour. For Eva, the nightmare is just beginning… Assassins Hunted is a fast-paced thrilling read in the vein of TV shows 24, Alias, and Spooks, and a must-read for fans of Jason Bourne, Jack Ryan and Killing Eve."

Sujets

• Suspens
• Espionnage
• Thrillers
• Suspense
• Suspenso
• Polars
• Assassins
• Espionage
• Renseignement
• Roman policier
• Assassin
• Thriller
• Mystère

Informations

• Publié par: Saxon Publishing
• Date de parution: 22 décembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781913498757
• Langue: English

Extrait

ASSASSINS HUNTED



RACHEL AMPHLETT
Assassins Hunted © 2018 Rachel Amphlett
First published 2018
This edition © 2020 Rachel Amphlett
The moral rights of the author have been asserted.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. While the locations in this book are a mixture of real and imagined, the characters are totally fictitious. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Have you missed a book? Download the FREE Official Reading Guide and Checklist to Rachel Amphlett’s books here
CONTENTS



Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Chapter 73


From the Author
ONE

Cyprus, present day
‘There’s a man holding a gun to Stefano’s head.’
For a fleeting second, Eva’s first thought was that Alex was talking about a character on the show playing on the television in the front room.
Then, she wondered what the hell he was doing changing the channels and watching something wholly inappropriate.
Finally, before the digital clock had blinked to the next second on the hour, she registered the frightened tone in his voice, and her head jerked up from the magazine she’d been reading.
Above her head a ceiling fan spun, pushing a cooling breeze between the open window of the dining area through the room and out towards the hallway. Moths dive-bombed against the window’s fly-screen that separated her from the outside world. The pages of the magazine article fluttered under her fingers, then her hair lifted off her shoulders as she spun on her heel.
She dropped her coffee mug as she moved, the sound of it smashing against the tiles following in her wake as she reached out to grab the kitchen bench to turn the corner without slowing down.
Eva cursed under her breath as her bare feet crossed the minefield of plastic building bricks Alex had left strewn across the floor in his haste to answer the intercom, before she raced to where he stood staring up at the wall next to the front door, fixated at the image streaming via video link from the condo’s gatehouse.
Almost within touching distance, she realised he was still dressed in his school uniform, instead of the pyjamas she’d asked him to change into twenty minutes ago. Her throat constricted at the sight of him, his vulnerability all too evident as he shifted from one foot to the other.
His hair sticking up on one side from where he’d been lying on the sofa, his blue eyes widened at the flickering image on the screen, before he turned to her, his mouth open in a little “o” of shock.
Eva held her finger to her lips, shook her head, then beckoned to him, fighting to keep her face calm and not let him see the fear that was crawling through her veins.
He blinked, then moved away from the camera’s range, edging along the wall to where she stood, her heart pounding.
He tried to slip his hand into hers, but she gently brushed it away and ruffled his hair.
‘Stay here,’ she whispered.
She lifted her chin, not waiting for his response, and instead took a deep breath and stepped in front of the monitor.
She swallowed.
Stefano, the security guard that manned the small security office from noon through to eight o’clock in the evening five days a week, was staring at her, sheer terror in his eyes.
She’d spoken to him on a regular basis, often stopping to chat after collecting Alex from the private ex-pat school he attended. He was in his late teens, and had taken the job to pay for his evening classes. He dreamt of becoming a chef, he’d said. Finish the course, then apply to some of the best cookery schools in France.
She’d asked him, once, how he’d got the job, as she’d wondered how effective the young man would be if threatened.
He’d rattled off his martial arts qualifications, the training the security company had given him, and she’d relaxed a little.
Perhaps a little too much.
Now, the barrel of a gun pressed into his brow so hard, she could see the skin puckering under its weight.
The owner of the gun was off camera, out of sight.
Alex was still small enough that he could only reach the lower button on the console to activate the video connection, and she silently counted her blessings that he couldn’t stretch up to touch the other controls.
Keeping her eyes on the image in front of her, she clicked her fingers once to make sure she had Alex’s attention, then made a movement with her hand; a movement she’d spent three years praying she’d never need to use.
She wondered, for a moment, if he’d remember the training because it had been a few weeks since they’d practised, and then she heard his tiny feet pattering away down the hallway towards the door next to the kitchen, the one that led to the special room that she’d insisted the condominium be built around. His footsteps stopped, and the sound of four staccato beeps reached her.
She waited until she heard the door slam shut, then counted to three.
On the screen, Stefano’s shoulders moved up and down, and even before pressing the intercom to connect their voices, she knew she’d hear his breathing, hard and panicked.
She punched the button, and didn’t waste time on niceties.
‘Who are you?’
No response.
Stefano’s eyes widened as the gun was pressed harder into the side of his skull, and Eva saw a tear roll down his cheek as his hand moved forward.
No, no – don’t open the gate!
‘Who are you?’ she repeated. ‘What do you want?’
She fought the tremor in her voice, her brain already planning, evaluating, discarding the different ways the scenario could play out.
Before she could move her lips to form another question, the front of Stefano’s skull exploded, blood and gore striking the screen as his body slumped forward.
She cried out, covering her mouth with her hands.
On the screen, a hand pushed Stefano’s body out of the way, and a figure wearing a black mask bent down until his dark eyes blazed from slits in the material, straight at the camera.
‘You,’ he said. ‘We want you. And the boy.’
The screen went blank, and Eva stepped away from the wall, terrified.
How had they found her?
She’d been so careful, severing all ties to the old days. She bit her lip, cursing herself. She’d missed something, evidently. Somehow, they’d tracked her down.
How long had they been watching, waiting?
She turned and ran to the front door, bent down to the mat and tugged her old running shoes onto her feet. She straightened, and sprinted to the kitchen, where she started pulling open the cupboard doors, lifting a bottle of cleaning fluid out and placed it on the counter-top.
She glanced at the closed steel door, the red light on the entry keypad blinking a steady beat, and bit her lip.
The Caretaker had told her the room would hold, that no matter what happened to the house around it, the space would be impenetrable.
Alex had enough supplies inside to last four weeks; easy-to-open packets of snacks, and plenty of water. If she missed her daily call to the Caretaker, he’d come. Wherever he was in the world, whatever hellhole he was currently inhabiting, he’d come.
She reached out to the cooker hob and turned the four gas outlets on full, then opened the oven door.
Within seconds, the putrid stench had begun to fill the space, and she ran across the room to close the window.
Dashing back past the kitchen bench, she grabbed the bottle of bleach, and moved back along the hallway, flicking off light switches as she went.
She ran into the living room, switched off the television and the table lamps, and the house finally plunged into complete darkness. Leaving the room, she pulled the door shut, then lunged for the front door and