Alicia Myles 2 - Crusader's Gold by David Leadbeater Page A

just as windows on all sides shattered; just as all hell broke loose in the city of heaven.
    War had come to Venice.

SEVENTEEN
     
     
    Alicia reacted with pure animal instinct. As a razor-edged waterfall rained down to her left, she upended the table and shoved it through the new gap. Two men, already leaping through, smashed head-first into the makeshift weapon, instantly collapsing. Alicia reached down for one of their discarded weapons; Russo scooped up the other. Behind them, Crouch shoved the false street preacher backwards so that he fell over a table. Tourists scrambled aside as he fell, arms and legs pinwheeling. Through the ruined front door came a swarm of operatives, all carrying weapons with barrels aimed at the floor.
    Alicia knew that wouldn’t last.
    “Down!” she yelled. “Get the fuck down!”
    Most of the café’s patrons were already scrambling to the floor. Those who couldn’t or wouldn’t, gawped. Alicia snatched a fleeting glimpse of a man calmly starting to raise his ceramic cup to his lips as the bullets started to fly. Crouch flung himself head-first, becoming tangled among a nest of tables.
    Behind the bar, shelves crammed full of cups and saucers, flavored syrups and cafetiéres, all set against a mirrored background for effect, started to bounce and shatter and break. A gleaming, expensive-looking coffee machine fractured down the middle, perforated with bullets. Staff screamed, ducking fast.
    Alicia was aware that the assault was happening on three sides, but still the hardest problem here was avoiding civilian casualties. As a third man stepped through the window to her left she put a bullet into his stomach, then grabbed him and spun him around. Bullets thwacked into his body without ceremony, answering her first question. Russo was down on one knee, aiming high, showering their attackers with chunks of falling ceiling. Alicia used the dead merc as body armor to glance around the corner of the devastated window. Outside, a narrow street was bordered by a small diameter railing with one of Venice’s signature canals lying beyond, the gilded end of a gondola just passing beyond sight. There was a gap of roughly twelve feet to the sheer stone façade of the building on the other side of the canal.
    No sign of mercs.
    “Out!”
    She crouched alongside Russo, signaling to Caitlyn to start crawling underneath the chair legs toward her. Every second that passed brought the mercs a little closer. A bullet shaved the edge of a table beside her. More barrels were starting to swing her way.
    Alicia saw their moment of opportunity rapidly closing. She grabbed Caitlyn’s outstretched wrist and pulled hard, employing all her strength to fling the girl toward the jagged gap. Caitlyn squealed but spun outside, jacket snagging on a glass spike.
    Crouch heaved another table toward their assailants. It was all about distraction and escape now—they couldn’t match firepower with firepower. A merc coming in from his left had already reached him. Crouch spun fast, ready to chop down at a gun hand but found himself faced by two whirling blades.
    Alicia cringed. What the fuck?
    One blade chopped into Crouch’s jacket, drawing blood, the other simultaneously spinning across his neck, missing by a whisker. Crouch staggered, shocked and momentarily unfocused. The merc was a woman, of medium build and height and with short-cropped hair—a black stubble. Muscles bulged around her body armor.
    Chick means business, Alicia thought and fired off a few rounds in her direction. The clip on her weapon was running low and needed saving.
    Healey rolled into view from behind the bar, catching at Crouch’s sleeve and dragging the man away from the female merc. Her cry of annoyance was more than primeval anger, it was a velociraptor at play. Alicia considered taking her out of the action, but before she could decide both Healey and Crouch were with them, pushing toward the window.
    “Move!” Russo cried.
    The