seat to face the Englishman, bringing up the gas injector—
Eddie spat the cigarette into his eye.
Sparks flew, the blinded man screeching and clapping a hand to his face—and Eddie yanked him over the armrest. The startled agent opposite found his line of fire blocked by his partner.
The anguished operative was still clutching the injector. Eddie clamped a fist around his hand and twisted it to jam the nozzle up against the goon’s jaw. There was a sharp hiss. The man’s shrieks turned to pure horror as he realized his death was just seconds away.
But the same would be true for Eddie if he couldn’t get clear …
He bodily shoved the dying man across the table, then snatched at a lever on his chair. The first-class seat slammed into its reclined position as Eddie threw himself back against it. The other man stood to bring his gun above his spasming partner—only to have the Smith & Wesson kicked from his hand as his target rolled backward.
Eddie crashed down in the next set of seats and scrambled to his feet. He had to get out of the carriage—the presence of witnesses would drastically limit Scarber and her men’s actions. He leapt into the aisle, about to sprint for the door at the end of the coach—
It opened. Another suited Asian man came through, gun raised.
Eddie dived across the aisle as he fired. A dull thump of lead against flesh and a choked scream came from behind him. The man beside Scarber had moved to retrieve his gun, only to take the bullet in his chest.
Another shot smacked into the seat back above Eddie. The new arrival was charging down the carriage for a clear shot. He needed a weapon. The dead goon’s gun had landed on the seats across from Scarber’s table. Eddie flung himself over the row of chairs. Another shot hissed overhead as he landed heavily.
The gun! Where was it?
He looked frantically about, hearing footsteps rapidly closing.
If it had fallen under the seats, he was doomed—
There, against an armrest. He snapped it up, firing blind over the seats. The running man ducked for cover.
Eddie jumped back into the aisle. Scarber was still in her seat, but had hooked her gun with one outstretched foot and was reaching under the table for it.
He pointed the SD9 at her and pulled the trigger—
It clicked. Empty.
Scarber nevertheless flinched as if she had received an electric shock. A brief exchange of hostile glares, then Eddie vaulted the dead man and ran for the rear of the carriage. “Get Jun and kill that bastard!” Scarber shouted.
The door automatically slid open as he approached. He darted into the boarding compartment. Two sets of doors ahead marked the connecting passage between this coach and the next—and through the glass he saw another man hurrying toward him.
Nowhere to go. The outer doors were sealed, controlled by the shinkansen’s crew and opening only when the train was stationary.
But there was another door, a NO ENTRY sign on it. He shoulder-barged it, but the lock held firm. The man was almost at the connecting passage.
Another slam—
The door burst open. Eddie fell into a cramped guard’s compartment, hip barking against a shelf-like desk on the back wall. A telephone was fitted above it, but there was no time to call anyone for help. He shut the door, jamming the handle with the empty gun.
Not that it mattered, as the compartment was too small to provide any cover. All the gunman had to do was fire through the door. He looked about in desperation. Nothing he could use for protection, no panels in the walls or floor—
A small hatch in the ceiling.
Eddie didn’t know where it led, or care. He scrambled onto the little desk and tugged at the hatch’s inset handle. If it was locked, he was dead. The handle rattled, but didn’t move.
Noises outside. The door juddered, clanking against the wedged gun. A kick, then another, harder. The panel around the catch buckled.
He gripped the handle with both hands, his entire weight on it. Metal creaked. A third strike from outside—
Something inside the hatch snapped—and it dropped open, wind screaming into the cubicle. Eddie grabbed the frame above and pulled himself up.
Onto the bullet train’s roof.
The slipstream mashed him against the opening’s rear edge with hurricane force. In the darkness the shinkansen’s white-painted carriages were little more than dim blocks shrinking into the distance ahead and behind, the only illumination the glow of the train’s internal lights on the concrete