“He has the equipment at home?” Jake asked.
“He always has it. The guy is a machine. I don’t think he ever sleeps.”
“That’s still not many people. Anyone else we can call?”
“And mobilize in the next fifteen minutes? We’re lucky we have this many.”
Jake chewed on his upper lip. “We’re going to be seriously outgunned.”
“Maybe.”
“No maybe about it.”
“You’re forgetting one thing, Caldwell. We don’t have to take them all down. We just have to get the evidence to nail them. Once you hand over the briefcase to the bad guys, we have the defined link between them and Wyatt.”
They passed 75th Street, and Shawnee Mission Medical Center lit up on their right. They were ten minutes from Jake’s apartment. Jake figured ten minutes to communicate their half-assed plan and another five to seven minutes to drive to the meeting site if they caught the lights along the way. They were cutting it close.
Snell read his mind. “They’ll wait. Trust me.”
“Not if Drabek gets there first and he has a head start on us. This thing could be over before we even show up.”
Jake pressed on the gas anyway, Snell’s car gobbling up the white lines. Overhead, thunder rumbled, and purple clouds spat fat raindrops. Under a neon, red billboard, the windshield appeared as if splattered with blood.
Eight minutes later they slid into Jake’s parking lot. The rain had poured like an open faucet for the last several minutes, slowing their progress as it washed across the blackened streets. It slowed to a drizzle as they parked Snell’s car. Across the lot, Bear hopped out of his truck as Jake emerged with the silver briefcase full of fake vials and retrieved the real Ares briefcase from the trunk. Across the street, a man and woman appeared from cookie cutter, dark sedans and scooted toward the building.
The man was five foot six and stocky, a crown of dark skin poking from a ring of close-cut, black hair. Briggs. He carried a long, leather case in one hand, the arm drawn straight by the weight. The woman, Foster, was thin, dressed in black with her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail. She ambled quick and light, agile like a cat as if her feet weren’t even touching the pavement. Bear lumbered over, his injured shoulder hanging low. Even in the dark light he was pale.
Inside Jake’s apartment, Snell directed her daughter to the couch and sat next to her. Briggs stood at the window, his case at his feet. Foster leaned against the wall; hands shoved in her jacket pocket which bulged from a holstered pistol. Bear fished in the kitchen cabinets for the bottle of whiskey. Snell made quick introductions. As she finished, Bear found the bottle and returned to the living room. He took a slug. Briggs raised his pencil-thin eyebrows.
“You sure that’s a good idea?” he asked Bear.
Bear held the bottle by its neck. “You get shot tonight?”
Briggs shook his head.
“Then shut the fuck up. My shoulder hurts like hell.”
“Where’s McKernan?” Foster asked, stationing herself by the window.
“On the way,” Snell said. “I’ll fill him in on the way to the meet.”
“What’s the plan, Jake?” Bear asked.
The simple plan took Jake a couple of minutes to lay out.
“The meet is in a courtyard in the stockyards. Based on the address, I think it’s near one of Keats’s buildings. I know the layout pretty well. It’s basically one big square building with a courtyard in the middle. Entrances to the courtyard from the street level on at least two sides, maybe three. It’s been awhile since I was down there. There’s several low-lying, abandoned buildings where you guys can set up.” He nodded to Briggs. “That a rifle in your bag?”
Briggs nodded.
“You a good shot?”
Briggs nodded again.
“He’s the best we’ve got,” Snell said.
“I was in the Marines,” he said, crossing his arms. “Won some medals in shooting competitions. Only one guy ever beat me, an Army hulk from the military police. I’m good enough.”
“Good,” Jake said. “We’ll stash you nearby so you can cover my ass during the meet. Keep your eyes peeled on the buildings surrounding the courtyard and the roof. Got a silencer on that thing?”
Briggs nodded again. A man of few words. Jake liked him.
“Beth,” Jake said, tossing her the keys to his truck. “You’re going to stay here. If you don’t hear from us in one hour, take my truck. It’s the red one in the parking lot.”
“Drive to Dana’s house and stay there,” Snell said, stroking Beth’s hair. “I’ll come get you when this is over.”
“What about me?” Bear took one more slug from the bottle, screwed the cap back on, and set it behind him on the counter.
“You and Foster are covering the getaway,” Jake said. “There’s two main ways out of the stockyards. One by Kemper Arena and the other by the entrance to I-70. When this is done, tail the bad guys and call it into 9-1-1. Wyatt’s got some kind of tie with the Chief of the Kansas City Police Department, so I expect the meet area will be clear of any police, but once the deal goes down, these bastards are fair game. If it goes right, we’ll exchange the briefcase for the money, and everyone will go on their merry way.” Jake cranked his head to Snell. “What’s your guy’s name?”
“McKernan,” Snell said, patting Beth on the leg and climbing to her feet. “He’ll film the whole thing. We’ll say you’re our informant working with us. I’ll catch hell for not following protocol, but we’ll have Wyatt and the bad guys.”
“You want me wired?” Jake asked.
Snell nodded. “McKernan has the gear.”
“You sure Drabek will be there?” Bear asked.
“I’m sure,” Jake said. “He has to get the money and he’s going to show up with a case. I have a plan to throw a monkey wrench into the works. But his goons will be there too. Stay sharp, Briggs.”
“All his goons minus one,” Bear said.
Jake laid out the rest of the plan in sixty seconds, and they scrambled out of the apartment. Jake and Snell took her car.
Snell gripped the steering wheel as if wringing the life out of it. “Is this going to work, Caldwell?”
“Guess we’ll find out in a few minutes.”
Chapter Fifty
They raced north through downtown Kansas City, catching most of the lights along the way. They snaked through the one-way streets to avoid the bar crowds and concertgoers near the Power & Light District. Bear and Foster were a minute or two ahead, each in their own cars. Briggs followed Snell’s Fusion in his own sedan.
They got caught at a stop light. A grizzled woman with frizzy, ashen hair and a shopping cart full of aluminum cans crossed the street in front of them. She looked like a homeless witch.
“Thank you,” Snell said as they waited, staring through the windshield at the woman.
“For what?”
“For helping me save Beth. You were amazing back there.”
Jake rubbed his knee while staring out the opposite window, uncomfortable with the praise. “You could have done it without me.”
“I don’t think so. So, thank you.”
Jake never took compliments well. He always felt like he didn’t deserve them. But this one felt good.
“You’re welcome,” he said. “Light’s green.”
Snell flashed a smile and hit the gas. They shot up Walnut, the buildings towering above them dark and quiet. A knot formed in Jake’s stomach. Was it an adrenaline dump, or was it fear from the suicidal mission they were about to embark upon?
“What are you going to do after this is over?” Snell asked.
“You mean if we make it out of this alive?”
“You don’t think we will?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes the bad guys win.”
“Sometimes they lose,” Snell said. “You a glass half-empty kind of guy?”
“I’m a realist. There’s a lot that can go wrong with this plan.”<
br />
Snell sat quiet for a moment, checking the mirror. Jake peered over his shoulder to ensure Briggs still followed them. Their turn to take them west to the Stockyards was a mile ahead. “It’s going to work. The bad guys sometimes win, but not tonight. What will you do when it’s over?”
Images flashed like a movie where Jake was the star. All the leg-breaking collections whirled, frightened and screaming faces, his own snarled mug swinging bats and pipes, committing acts he now hated himself for. He thought back to last week, a Norman Rockwell moment of his daughter Halle snuggled against him on one side and Maggie on the other as they watched a movie. The movie sucked, but he didn’t even care. He remembered feeling happy but guilty, as if he didn’t deserve either of them. That the peace and love filling his soul wasn’t earned—yet maybe it could be. He knew Maggie could chase the ghosts of the past away.
“I’m going to marry Maggie,” he said at last. The revelation spilling out of his mouth before his brain finished processing the thought. “I don’t deserve her, but I’m going to do it anyway if she’ll have me.”
“Will she?”
“I think so. I hope so. The last six months with her and Halle have shown me what a family can be. That it doesn’t have to be as screwed up as the ones you and I appear to have.”
“You think my family’s screwed up?”
“Nah. Everybody has an ex who is willing to kidnap their daughter to facilitate the sale of highly toxic poison to a bunch of Middle East terrorists.”
“Asshole,” Snell said.
“Me or Wyatt?”
“Both of you.”
Their turn approached, and Snell’s phone rang. Bear’s name flashed. She retrieved it from the console and clicked on the speaker button.
“We have a problem,” Bear said.
* * *
Wyatt Drabek turned off I-35, tires screeching in protest. He headed down the hill and spun right, the Stockyards looming ahead, masked in darkness save for the light spilling from streetlamps. On the left, Kemper Arena lay silent, the strange architectural monolith lit by a myriad of spotlights blasting up its side. It’s stark whiteness a glaring contrast to the shuttered, red-brick buildings surrounding it.
With no sign of pursuit, he slowed to the building where the meet would take place and craned his neck over the steering wheel, searching for any signs of movement from windows of the building surrounding the courtyard. Seeing none, he slipped through the open iron gate, the beams from his headlights scattering the shadows in the empty courtyard. His watch read a few minutes to midnight.
His hand rested on the silver briefcase in the passenger seat, his brain running ninety miles an hour, rehearsing how the exchange would go with the man he’d spoken to over the phone. He knew Stanton was in place in one of these buildings. He just wished he knew which one.
Bright lights washed over his car as a black Suburban pulled into the lot behind him. The vehicle paused, and Drabek waved. After a moment, the SUV made a slow, wide swing around the courtyard. It stopped thirty feet from the nose of Drabek’s sedan and the lights went dark. Drabek’s heart thudded in his chest as the gravity of his dangerous ploy went from theoretical to real. But he was in too deep to back out now. He snagged the briefcase by the handle and stepped out of the car.
* * *
“What do you mean blocked?” Snell stopped the car as Jake winced at the news.
“I mean there’s a cop car straddled across the entrance to the Stockyards on both ends. Foster called me thirty seconds ago and said the same thing.”
“Ware,” Jake said.
“My ex must be pulling favors from the Police Chief. He’s gotta have some kind of dirt on him.”
“Blocking the road until the exchange goes down,” Jake said.
“Did you stop?” Snell asked.
“Hell no,” Bear replied. “Neither did Foster. We both cruised on past, but this blows our covering the getaway vehicles after this deal happens, not to mention you guys getting into the area.”
Briggs stepped out of his car and walked to Snell’s vehicle. She rolled down the window and relayed the news. “Any ideas?”
In the darkness, there were no signs of life in the Stockyards. Thirty seconds later, a pair of headlights cruised slow in the distance and disappeared around a corner.
“Bet that’s our boy,” Briggs said.
“Could we talk our way past the cops?” Jake asked. “Flash them your FBI badge?”
“I’m sure the Chief gave them strict orders nobody gets past. For all we know, he might have us on a watch list. We can’t afford to take a chance on getting picked up.”
Bear’s voice sounded from the phone. “Wumbly Road.”
“Where’s that?” Jake asked.
“It’s not really a road. More of a dirt track running to the Stockyards off Sidebar Road. Logan and I used it a couple of times during the task force. We had an informant at one of Keats’s warehouses who’d meet us there.”
“Can we find it?”
“Probably not in the dark. Give me a minute and I’ll come show you. Can’t do a damn thing with the cops right here anyway.”
“Hurry up,” Jake said. “We’re running out of time, if we haven’t already.”
Snell told Briggs to call Foster and tell her to find a place to hole up close to the Stockyards. She’d call them after the exchange. She no sooner hung up when McKernan called. He was sixty seconds from their position. They waited, and he revved up in a battered, green Jeep Cherokee. His six-foot-two wiry frame approached the waiting trio with a military gait, rubbing his bald head. Snell relayed the plan while McKernan cleaned his wire-framed glasses with his shirt tail. As Snell finished, Bear arrived in his truck.
They climbed in their respective cars and drove a half mile toward the Stockyards, Bear leading the way through a series of narrow blacktop roads. He stopped in front of a rutted, dirt track leading through a skinny row of brush. The protruding branches would scrape the paint off their vehicles. They hopped out of their cars in front of the track splitting the opening in the overgrown foliage.
“Once you get through the brush,” Bear said, pointing into the darkness, “the road will widen and run alongside an old warehouse. Keep going and it will dump you out on West 14th Street. Your meeting location is a quarter mile from there.”
“I’ll follow you in,” McKernan said, pulling out a small pack and bundle of wires. “Find some place to set up the camera.”
“It’s going to be a fucking parade,” Bear said.
“They’ll be watching me come in,” Jake said, lifting up his shirt so McKernan could wire him for sound, “not looking for anyone else. Keep your lights off and avoid the streetlights if you can. Snell go with Briggs. I want you close in case I get pinned. Bear, follow us in and find someplace nearby to hole up.”
Briggs approached with a case. Small packs with earpieces. Snell handed them out to her team and gave another to Bear. At least they would be able to maintain contact. She showed Bear how to work the device.
“You sure you don’t want me coming with you?” Bear asked, sticking the earpiece in.
“Nah,” Jake replied. “If I get you shot again, your wife would kick my ass.”
Bear slapped Jake on the back. “Be careful. Don’t get killed.”
Bear hefted himself into his truck. McKernan tested Jake’s microphone and gave a thumbs up. He removed a video camera and bag from his trunk and put them in his car.
Snell handed Jake an earpiece. “We’ll be able to talk to you and hear what’s going on. Better hope the bad guys don’t look too close. Keep your head turned away if you can.”
“If they ask, I’ll tell them it’s my hearing aid.”
“Aren’t you a little young for a hearing aid?”
He closed his tired eyes for a moment. “Right now, I feel old enough to have one.”
“Be careful,” she said, voice tender, eyes moist.
Jake rested his palm on her cheek. “You too
. I’ll see you when this is over.”
She dropped into the passenger side of Briggs’s car. Butterflies swarmed Jake’s gut. He took the driver’s seat and led the caravan into the darkness.
Chapter Fifty-One
Stanton rested the rifle on a crate so the barrel wouldn’t protrude from the window. He’d tried calling Devaroux a few times with no response. It could mean anything from weak cell service in the hospital to Devaroux was compromised. The fact he didn’t seem to have trouble contacting his man earlier to give the kill order gave him a moment of pause. If Devaroux failed, their leverage against Caldwell was reduced to Snell’s daughter. But, Drabek called him on the way and said Caldwell and Snell showed up at Blue Heron. So, even that leverage could be gone. Drabek escaped with the remaining handful of vials of Ares, but the insufficient number wouldn’t make their customers happy. If Caldwell didn’t show up with the full case, they were fucked anyway.
He tracked Drabek’s sedan pulling into the courtyard through the gate. Drabek appeared to be alone, which was a good sign. A minute later, the SUV circling the group of buildings earlier appeared. It breached the courtyard and turned around facing Drabek’s car. Stanton glanced to the roof and could make out the head of the man positioned there. The one on the third floor in the building next to him was shrouded by shadows.
A slim man with a dark, trimmed beard emerged from the passenger side of the black Suburban as Drabek got out of his car, the silver briefcase in hand. The driver of the SUV remained behind the wheel. A third figure emerged from the Suburban and circled around at a forty-five-degree angle. Stanton trained his sights on the back of the first guy’s head, the guy approaching his boss.
* * *
The two darkened vehicles trailing Jake peeled away as they approached the building where the meet would occur. Briggs and Snell circling behind a three-story, shuttered brick building that last held a short-lived sports bar. The brake lights flashed as they stopped, followed by two figures jumping out. McKernan drove past where Snell stopped, disappearing.
Jake Caldwell Thrillers Page 49
