[DEAD DROP is available to buy now in ebook form on Smashwords and at the Amazon Marketplace at the following links (UK/US/Ca/Fr/De/Au). The following is a free extract from the novel's 1st chapter.]
'I will give you this much credit,' the Nazi commandant said. 'Your
fellows put up a good fight. Two of our pumping stations destroyed,
along with significant damage to the machinery for opening the dock
gates. Yet this is but a minor annoyance. These things can be rebuilt
or repaired in time. The dock gate we believe was your main target is
still intact, even if we have not yet had time to remove the
destroyer you attempted to ram it with.'
He paced the small room. It seemed as though he was still trying to
come to terms with the situation as he described it to his two
prisoners, who were tied to chairs by the back wall. Two armed guards
surveyed the scene from next to the room's only door. The
commandant's shadow circled him as he walked beneath the naked
lightbulb hanging from the ceiling.
'Sometimes I wonder if you British think that bravery will compensate
for the stupidity of your plans,' he continued, walking towards his
prisoners. 'Surely you did not believe that even using a warship as a
battering ram would be enough to destroy such heavily fortified
gates? And now many of your men have died as a result of that
miscalculation and in exchange for us needing to repair only some
minor machinery, we have captured two of the most infamous soldiers
in the Commando unit.'
He stared at the prisoner on the left, a young man of light brown
hair and a face chiselled in regimented angles, which was stained
with blood and filth from the battle from earlier in the morning.
'Geoffrey White...' the commandant said.
The man tied up next to White was of a similar age but bore a much
stockier build. A handlebar moustache burst out from beneath the
plump nose on a face as broad and rugged as a Scottish highland. As
with White, his skin and hair were crusted with the dark colours of
the morning raid. A long piece of shrapnel was embedded deeply in a
bloody wound beneath his chest.
'...And 'Raging' Robbie Armstrong,' the commandant said. 'Once we are
finished, I think I will keep the sword you brought with you as a
souvenir. When your little island is finally beaten into submission,
perhaps it will hang above my mantle in Kent.'
He turned and glanced at the Claymore sword lying on a table at the
opposite side of the room. He chuckled to himself, then his face
turned serious again.
'My name is Commandant Scheisskerl. If you co-operate, perhaps you
will be allowed to live out the rest of the war in Bavaria,' he said.
'But if you choose not to talk, then I shall have to resort to less
hospitable methods.'
He walked over to the table and removed a metal hook from a pouch of
surgical tools.
'We have scientists working at our camps across Europe whose sole
duty is to devise unique methods of inflicting unimaginable amounts
of pain,' Scheisskerl said. 'This one enters the nose to probe nerves
directly connected to the most potent pain-sensing areas of the
brain. It is only one of many such inventive tools. What do you
think? Perhaps I shall use it on you first, Mr. White?'
'Oh thank God!' Armstrong said.
'Charming!' White replied. 'Not quite the spirit of camaraderie you
were trying to stoke up in Marrakesh when we were dividing up those
girls...'
'Trust you to bring that up now,' Armstrong said. 'After all the
times I've bailed you out of trouble! Let's not forget the Smolensk
situation.'
'Or the siege of the Belgrade bath-house!' White retorted.
'That was a draw!'
'Utter rot! If I hadn't smuggled in those pistols under my towel, at
considerable risk to my...'
'Will you please shut up!' Scheisskerl bellowed. 'Do you think it is
wise not to take me seriously?'
'How on earth are we supposed to take seriously a man who tries to
use a life in Bavaria as a bargaining tool?' Armstrong said. 'I've
heard you people eat cold meat and cheese for breakfast. What sort of
a country...'
Before he had finished his sentence, the commandant grabbed the
shrapnel sticking out of Armstrong's torso and twisted it. Armstrong
winced in pain.
White glanced over at him, offering a small nod of support.
'You can be brave for now, if you wish,' Scheisskerl said. 'But
though your countrymen take pride in this act, I have made enough of
you beg for death through tears and blood to know what cowards you
really are.'
Armstrong stared Scheisskerl in the eye and lurched his body forward,
forcing the shrapnel all the way through his abdomen. The commandant
stepped back in horror.
'Then you'll have to do something worse than picking my nose,
German,' Armstrong said.
Scheisskerl sneered. He walked back to the table and took a moment to
choose from the tools on offer. He settled on a long, thin blade.
'At first, I will keep it simple,' he said. 'So we will have
something to look forward to.'
He walked back to Armstrong.
'Since you seemed so pleased for me to torture your friend, I will
oblige you,' he said. 'Have you changed your mind?'
'Not at all,' Armstrong said. 'In fact, I'll give you a hand.'
A bloodied fist swung around from behind his chair, hammering into
the commandant's face. Armstrong dropped the shard of bloody shrapnel
into White's tied hands and charged forward.
The guards raised their rifles, each aiming at one of the two
Englishmen. Armstrong pulled Scheisskerl in front of himself and
White as a human shield. The commandant shrieked as bullets thudded
into his back.
The guards hesitated before firing again, realising what they had
done.
Armstrong grabbed Scheisskerl's blade from the floor and attacked.
The guards raised their rifles but Armstrong bulldozed his heavy
frame into them, sending all three men tumbling to the floor. He
rammed the blade into the neck of the nearest guard.
The other had collected his rifle and scrambled out of Armstrong's
reach. As he was about to pull the trigger, a chair came flying at
him from the other side of the room, knocking him onto his side and
sending his shot into the wall. Armstrong dived for the rifle
belonging to the dead man at his feet. The guard took aim again but
Armstrong had the split-second advantage and fired a shot through his
heart.
'Here,' White said, offering Armstrong his hand. 'How's the wound?'
'Numbed by all the whisky on the way over here,' Armstrong said,
getting to his feet. He was not sure whether the pool of blood
beneath him was his own or from one of the guards. 'It'll be fine if
we keep moving.'
'You know, I could have untied those knots with a little more time,'
White said, as Armstrong tore strips off his shirt sleeve to patch
himself up. 'Even by your standards, that trick with the shrapnel was
rather grotesque.'
'I've been shot enough times to know how to avoid the vital organs,'
Armstrong said, prodding at the wound now running all the way through
his chest. He picked up his claymore from the table and practised a
swing with it. 'Anyway, we don't have more time. Those four tonnes of
explosives in the ship we left on the dock gate obviously haven't
blown up yet. If those damn Nazis still haven't found it, they will
soon. We'll have to do what the detonator hasn't.'
Need some action in your life? DEAD DROP is available now at Smashwords.
