ANTALYA
TURKEY
NICKY SHAW VIGOROUSLY PUMPED the hand of Jim Hall when they met at Pinky’s, a gaudy little restaurant that was a painted cube of concrete blocks near the beach. “I almost had a bad case of the sads when I heard you got yourself killed,” Shaw said, with a broad smile that flashed perfect teeth. “Thought, Dang, should have had a life insurance policy on ol’ Jim.”
“Death is sometimes overrated.” Hall took in the big man. “You still look like an NFL linebacker.”
“Image, my man. Gots to sell the image. Big, bad muthas.” Shaw was clean shaven, including his domed head, and had a jaw like a granite square. Muscles bulged at his neck, and his biceps pushed at his shirtsleeves. He wore all black except for a large chunk of turquoise and silver that had been made into a belt buckle. Nicky had grown up on the dangerous back streets of Washington, D.C., and become an Army Ranger and then a mercenary in Iraq. When he saw the money available for that sort of work, he started his own company.
“How’s business?” asked Hall.
“Same shit, different day,” replied Shaw. “I don’t go out in the sandbox anymore unless I have to. Incirlik turned out to be a good location for my headquarters. I can run teams anywhere they are needed, and the gummint provides the air transport for free. Pay’s awful good.”
“I got a job for you. A hundred-thousand-dollar job.”
Shaw did not lose his smile, and his eyes flicked over to a pair of pale girls walking by in skimpy bikinis. European tourists. “You still with the Company?”
“Nope. Retired. That’s why I have to reach out when I need help. The Langley boys are no longer my best friends.”
Nicky Shaw laughed. “Mine neither. Whatcha got?”
“Need some goons to take out a nerd back home. You don’t need to know why. Interested?”
“A terminal kinda situation, then? That sorta thing?”
“Absolutely. But I want him banged up and hurt some first. At his home.”
“Sounds like Jimmy-boy wants to send a message to somebody. This nerd got a wife and kids we need to worry about?”
“Yes. Wife and a daughter and a son. Collateral damage is fine by me.”
Nicky Shaw watched two girls walk slowly down the beach, hips almost touching. “You know, Jim, the U.S. dollar ain’t as strong as it used to be. You want me to broker a hit, well, okay, I can do that, but that hunnerd thousand needs to be in euros, not greenbacks.” Shaw took a PDA from his pocket and found the information. “As of today, one euro goes for one-point-five-oh-eight-seven. Round it down to a buck and a half, so I can give a deal to an old friend.”
“For that price, you guarantee the work. I want your personal confirmation when it’s done. And you throw in a piece of equipment, a sniper rifle and fifty rounds.”
“I always guarantee on a contract. Gimme a number I can call you at. On the second thing, the big gun, fine. Not a fifty-cal, though. You going to tell me what kind of mischief you up to, needin’ that bit of gear? Need any help, a spotter?”
Jim Hall said, “Everything you need to know about the propeller-head is in an envelope under your place mat. I’ll transfer half the money now to an account of your choice. Other half when you are done. Sniper rifle is for a friend.”
“Fine,” said Nicky. “Anything particular I need to tell my people?”
Jim Hall would not explain that the target, Lieutenant Commander Benton Freedman, was the resident computer genius for the dark black hunter-killer group known as Task Force Trident. Hall had studied dossiers on all of them in the past, and there wasn’t a weak link in the bunch. Kyle Swanson would have made sure that Freedman would be leading the electronic attack on Hall’s assets. The man was no physical commando, but he was a protected component of the Trident brotherhood. It was better if Nicky did not know that. “No. This guy is just a Navy computer geek who is nosing around places where he should not be involved. Works at the Pentagon and lives in the ’burbs. Piece of cake. Just do it fast, like day before yesterday.”
“Know what I think? Sounds like an Agency black job reaching through you to me, sittin’ here minding my own bidness in Turkey, to run a hit back in the States.” He wrote a bank number on the back of a cream-colored business card and handed it across the table.
“I told you, Nicky. The Agency’s not involved. This is personal.”
“That’s what you always say,” Nicky Shaw said, standing up and sliding on a narrow pair of dark sunglasses. He put away the PDA, folded the envelope, and stuffed it in a pocket. “I’ll get right on it.”
ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA
NIGHT BROUGHT THE COMFORTABLE cover that the hit team needed for their home invasion, and the fantasy that nothing could stop three large armed and dangerous predators who viewed the coming attack as little more than an evening of fun and a nice paycheck. They had to stay alert, so limited themselves to one beer apiece and a shared marijuana joint as they waited for Lieutenant Commander Benton Freedman to come home.
“Glad it’s finally dark,” said the leader, Samuel Achmed Fox, his big frame slouched in the passenger seat of the little Nissan. “Get this over with. Little Jap cars ain’t made for comfort. You shoulda stole an American, like a big Ford SUV.” His hand rested on the butt of a pistol stuffed into the front of his pants.
“You tol’ me to get something that wouldn’t be noticed. There are more Jap cars in this neighborhood than in downtown Tokyo.” Vincent Parma caught a strand of his long black hair and hooked it behind an ear as he sucked on the joint, catching the smoke in his lungs and holding it as long as possible.
He passed it up to the driver, LeGarret Shields, a nervous kid with shifty eyes, youngest of the three. All had served time together for various crimes, their bodies were painted with raw jailhouse tattoos, and they enjoyed inflicting violence on others. “Why not pay us the rest of the money now, Achmed?” LeGarret already had five thousand dollars in his pocket and was mentally counting the five thousand yet to come.
“After it’s done, bro. After it’s done. Don’t worry. I’ll hand it to you right when we get back in the car. Meanwhile, think about what might be worthwhile in the house that we can take. Could be some good shit.” Parma and Shields each got ten thousand for the hit, and Fox would pocket the lion’s share, twenty-five thousand. After all, he was the one who got the call from Nicky Shaw a few hours ago. He had made it to the bank in time to cash the wire transfer.
The car drove in loops and figure eights through the area, all three men low in their seats. Two black men and a dark-skinned Italian, all dressed in black, would draw the immediate attention of any passing police cruiser in this suburban neighborhood, so they roamed, centering their pattern on a corner house two blocks in from the nearest large street. A single porch light had automatically come on at dusk. The driveway remained empty. They circled. Had another joint. Stayed cool. Took time for a hamburger and bathroom break at McDonald’s.
Their car climbed the hill once again, then nosed around a right-hand turn, and LeGarret pulled to the curb and shut off the lights. “Damn, there’s the mutha, right there! He just got home.”
Parma leaned forward between the guys in the front seat to get a better view. In the dim light from the porch and the light that popped on from inside the target’s car, they made out the figure of a skinny man in the white uniform of a naval officer. “Got to be him. He’s alone, too. No lights in the house, so the family ain’t home.”
“Damn,” said Shields. “I wanted a piece of his wife.”
The target unlocked his front door and went inside, and immediately a series of lights bloomed throughout the house. Living room, kitchen, bedroom, bath.
“Now?” asked LeGarret Shields, his tongue licking his dry lips.
“Not quite. Let him get settled for a minute. Probably taking a leak, then he’ll make some food and turn on the TV. Get comfortable.”
The figure came unexpectedly into view again, walking down the driveway, pulling a green plastic trash cart out for curbside pickup. He had a blue plastic carton of recycled cans under one arm, propped on his hip but resting on a little towel to protect his white uniform.
“Fuck waiting,” hissed Parma. “This is the chance. If he’s taking out the garbage, he’s already off guard and getting comfortable. Soon as he goes back inside, we do it.”
“Unh-hunh. You right. Get ready.” Achmed Fox pulled his pistol free and rested it on his leg. “Go on up there now, LeGarret, soon as he’s back inside.” Fox felt the car drop into gear and slowly creep forward, sticking to the curb.
“Let’s go on and do it,” said Fox, his voice now tense, ready. He threw open the door of the car and climbed out, waiting only a moment for the others to form up beside him; then all three advanced rapidly up the walk and onto the porch. Parma reached up with his pistol and smashed the front porch light as Fox opened the screen door and kicked hard with his steel-toed boot at the lock on the wooden door.
It crashed open, and the three of them dashed inside, looking at the startled man across the room. Little dude in a white uniform. Calm. Fox had expected to see fear. He shouted, “Get your ass on the floor, muthafucka! Get down or I’ll cap you where you stand.”
LeGarret Shields closed the door and turned to look at their prisoner. “What you grinnin’ at, muthafucka?” he yelled at the sailor, who was kneeling, hands locked behind his head.
Then all of the lights went out.
There was a muffled crummpp sound, and Vincent Parma screamed as a high-velocity bullet took out his right knee. He dropped to the wooden floor, and a second rip of bullets shredded the middle of his chest. Another cough from a different direction, and the back of LeGarret’s head exploded.
Before Samuel Achmed Fox could react, an incredibly strong hand reached out in the blackness, closed around his pistol, and snatched it away at the same time a muscular arm wrapped in a tight V around his neck and tightened in a choke hold. The oxygen was cut off, and Fox tried to pry off the arm, but it was as if it were made of steel and concrete. His resistance faded; he could not breathe. The lights came back on, and as his sight faded, he saw four men in full battle gear watching him.
The little sailor spoke. “We’ve been expecting you,” Freedman said. “Let’s have a talk.”
Then the arm turned Fox loose and he toppled over, gasping for breath as his lungs burned in pain. His neck felt broken.