LOCKED DOWN: (A NICOLE GRANT THRILLER, BOOK 1)

by Ed Kovacs

  Oi Lam had to do everything in her power right now to make sure General Ma remained unharmed. “Is she telling the truth?” asked Oi Lam as she touched Ma's arm.

  Ma hesitated. “I imagine so.”

  Oi Lam turned to Nicole. “Then I will help you. If you promise not to hurt him.” Oi Lam stood up. Ma looked completely vexed, but didn't try to stop her.

  “You have my word,” said Nicole.

  The old technician narrowed his eyes and lurched forward, but Hernandez grabbed him and slammed him against the wall. “Don't get cute, pops.” Hernandez drilled the man with a killer stare, and then backed up to his position next to the door. He pressed one hand over his shoulder wound, as if the amount of blood concerned him. Oi Lam knew that if a blood pathway had been nicked, the American would die.

  She settled in next to Nicole, who sat in front of a PC at the long counter. “Let me see what you have,” said General Ma's mistress.

  ###

  Vice Premier Zhao Yiren, Zhao's Chief of Security Lin, and MSS Special Projects Director Tang Jie climbed out of the helicopter on the Tianhe-2 complex grounds at Sun Yat-sen University, East Campus in Guangzhou. Chinese military radar had tracked Ma's copter here, and Zhao knew why he’d come; his girlfriend was working inside.

  Tang had a single earbud running from his cell phone to his ear as they all walked in a crouch from under the spinning rotor blades. The pilot took off again to refuel, just as General Ma's pilots had done. As the whine of the engines faded and the rotor wash abated, Zhao turned to Tang. “Well?”

  “Same as the last call,” said Tang, pulling the earbud from his ear. “You are hated in Guangzhou, so no one will unofficially help you. They all say the same thing. Make a request through official channels in Beijing.”

  Zhao lit a cigarette using his well-practiced ritual, sucked the nicotine deep into his lungs, then took in the surroundings. Instinct told him to act fast, and his mood was restless. He wanted to get back to his Beijing condo and get a massage and more from his new favorite girl, Qui Qui, since the non-fling with the non-blonde in Hong Kong had left him feeling randy.

  “Then we'll do the job ourselves,” said Zhao, a bit drunkenly, “just like I did in the old days. The campus police will help us kill the Americans, don't you agree, Chief Lin?”

  “I should think so,” said Lin, as he chambered a round into his semi-automatic pistol.

  “Even though you are unpopular, every man with a gun in Guangzhou will come here to kill the Americans if they touch the supercomputer,” said Tang.

  “Better if we finish quickly. The fewer involved the better,” said Zhao, flicking his cigarette and stepping toward the entrance.

  ###

  Oi Lam didn't need to set up a countdown clock; a digital countdown was built into Nicole Grant's software and displayed on one of the flat monitors. The algorithm Grant had stolen from Carnegie Mellon and then tweaked, was working—the files stored on the Darknet two years ago were being fully restored. But the countdown was cruel—sometimes it slowed or stopped, depending on progress, similar to running a scan or downloading a program on a home computer. The countdown display read 07:02.

  Grant and Oi Lam nervously stared at the monitors as the sprawling supercomputer on the other side of the windows in front of them ramped up to full operating capacity. General Ma sat on a chair in the corner looking wrinkled and morose; the scowling older technician sat on the floor. The angry young technician was now bound and gagged but still unconscious. Ron Hernandez had also brought the body of the dead guard into the control room as a reminder to the Chinese present not to try anything.

  Six minutes and change, now. An eternity, thought Hernandez, as he stole a glance at the countdown readout while standing guard at the door. The earlier three gunshots had brought out a few curious technicians working night shift in the big, mostly empty complex. They had approached the hallway door where he'd scared them off by brandishing the gun. That had been several minutes earlier. Now the building seemed still as stone. It had been more than twenty-five minutes since they first entered the building. Staying for six more minutes was insanity.

  He had the Kimber with seven rounds remaining; the silenced Type-67 with one round remaining; and the guard's out-of-date Type-54 with six 7.62 x 25mm caliber rounds. Fourteen rounds in three different pistols. The gun Grant had gotten from General Ma in the CIA condo was a Chinese-made QSZ-92. She might have a dozen rounds left, but it was bad form to check your partner's weapon; she'd need that pistol.

  “General Ma, are you still in the game?” asked Hernandez with a sharp edge. “Because if you are, your pilot needs to be circling the university, ready to land at a moment's notice.”

  Before Ma could respond, Hernandez heard the hallway door open that led into the changing room. He spun to look through the small doorway window and saw a group of men including two security guards holding pistols enter the changing room. A voice cried out, “That's him!” The men all raised their weapons.

  Hernandez didn't hesitate. He fired one round through the window in the door, shattering it and sending glass spraying all over himself, then fired again. One guard went down, and for a millisecond, Ron Hernandez locked eyes with Zhao Yiren. The Chinese all returned fire and the rounds impacted into the steel control room door. Hernandez squeezed off two more unaimed shots without exposing his head through the window.

  He chanced a quick look, and a guy wearing a suit standing in the doorway fired. The round grazed the side of Hernandez's skull and he started to bleed like a stuck pig. He'd seen one guard down on the floor, while the others had retreated from the changing room and regrouped in the hallway.

  Hernandez glanced at the group in the control room. Grant and Oi Lam looked terrified and Ma and the old technician didn't look much better. Ten rounds left and the countdown clock read 05:57.

  ###

  Zhao Yiren's eyes had never been so wide open, thought Chief Lin as he looked at his boss, with his back pressed tight against the hallway wall. And the orbs looked extra bloodshot. Yes, the man was drunk, but that was nothing new. Alcoholic or not, Zhao was Lin's ticket to the top of the heap and he intended to reach that destination. Lin then shifted his gaze to Director Tang, who was taking quick looks into the changing room. Tang was a cool customer, Lin knew that. He'd take pride in killing him very soon, after Ma, Hernandez and Grant were erased. Those were his secret orders. Zhao had given him the assignment mere hours earlier. A little cleanup was in order before the doors to Lin's political future and fabulous reward would fully open.

  “Is there another way into the computer room?” Tang asked the guard.

  “An emergency exit through the rear airlock. But I have to get a key first.”

  Tang nodded and turned to Zhao and Lin. “If you handle this end, I'll take the other entrance.”

  Zhao waved them off. Once Tang and the guard were out of sight, Zhao leaned in close to his security chief. “Lin, I know you're ambitious. If you can get into that control room and kill everyone before soldiers or police arrive, it will be better for us. I'll be able to spin these events as I wish. And when I become president you can name your position in the Chinese government. Do it now, don't wait for Tang to get into place, because you must kill him, too.”

  Lin smiled. This was exactly what he wanted to hear. “Give me cover fire. The shooting will disguise any sounds I make.”

  The men checked their weapons, and then nodded to each other. Lin flung the hallway door open and Zhao opened fire, delivering a fusillade of lead as he emptied the magazine. With bullets whizzing overhead, the security chief scrambled in a fast crab walk across the changing room all the way to the control room door. He squatted just under the blown out doorway window that led into the control room.

  ###

  Supercomputer control rooms are supposed to be sterile, hushed environments where important work is performed and talented scientists and researchers work with engineers to achieve breakthroughs in computing achie
vement, all to benefit mankind. Such control rooms are not supposed to be the scene of gunfights with dead people and broken glass strewn about.

  Bullets screamed into the control room and Grant flinched as the flat panel monitor in front of her and Oi Lam was shattered by a ricochet. She instinctively crouched down onto the floor and pulled Oi Lam with her. Grant's cognition seemed to downshift into slow motion as she looked over to the door. As if in a dream, a gun appeared through the small window in the steel door. Ron Hernandez looked a bloody mess as he crouched next to the door. The deafening sound of the firing took away her hearing, and then her world shifted into even slower speed. The door opened and a large Chinese man hurtled in, grabbing Hernandez as he came. They tumbled into a heap. Her brain processed the recognition of the man. He was Lin, the cruel security chief she'd met at Zhao's condo.

  Temporarily deaf, Grant found herself standing and was immediately slammed onto the counter, knocking a PC onto the floor as hands grabbed her throat. It was the old technician, strangling her. She twisted and fell, then somehow staggered to her feet, but he wouldn't let go.

  She watched, in some kind of shock consciousness, as Hernandez and Lin wrestled around on the floor. Her partner struggled to break free and stand, but failed. Lin slammed him repeatedly in his face with his fist. Hernandez looked dazed and seemed to be the weaker fighter, but he managed to reach up and pull a keyboard from the counter and then jam it into Lin's face, breaking his nose.

  In her ethereal-like vision, Grant saw General Ma moving now. Walking in some kind of half-time measure since her visual perception had been oddly slowed. Ma took Oi Lam by the arm and led her to the doorway. Smart man, getting out while he can.

  Grant's eyes shifted to the black eyes of the man killing her. He held such hate, such anger. Fear. Every failure, every slight in his entire life was being avenged in this rage-filled moment as he tightened his grip on her neck. She thought of her mom, Jan. She loved her mom so much and wanted to see her again. Wanted to drink coffee and gossip and take her for a long drive in the mountains where they would remember old times and talk of her father. Her father who, in the last years of his life, she treated with such disrespect. With barely concealed contempt. He died having a daughter who'd turned her back on him. Shame washed over her. She barely noticed as her attacker's eyes bulged out and he squeezed her neck harder. Then a thought stabbed her with the headline that she had only seconds to act, if she wanted to live.

  CHAPTER 36

  01:12

  General Ma had never seen combat, but this was close enough. As soon as Lin started spraying lead into the control room, Ma was on the move. He had to practically drag Oi Lam with him, she was so terrified. Somehow, the four shots fired by Lin had missed hitting anyone. With Lin and Hernandez now fighting on the floor, it was a good time to leave. He'd already texted his pilot using Oi Lam's phone and ordered his refueled bird to land.

  The steel control room door, now pock-marked with bullet slugs, closed behind them. They were almost clear. He ripped off his clean room gown and pulled the covering from his head. He and Oi Lam had hurried half way across the changing room floor when Zhao, looking quite insane and holding a pistol, stepped into the doorway and blocked them from exiting into the hall.

  “Zhao!” shouted Ma, pretending to be relieved to see his old friend. “The Americans kidnapped me! Lin needs help in there! Give me your gun and I'll kill Hernandez and Grant. No need for you to bloody your hands this close to the election, old friend.”

  “You weren't kidnapped, old friend. You're a traitor.” Zhao sprayed spittle as he spoke the words, slurring.

  “No, you misunderstand!”

  Zhao fired four times, two bullets into each of them. Oi Lam screamed and her legs gave out slowly, as if she didn't want to fall hard and hurt her baby. General Ma, in utter disbelief, swayed on his feet as he tried to comprehend what happened. The woman who carried his unborn son had just been shot right next to him. It couldn't possibly be true. Ma's eyes rolled upward and he collapsed into a rumpled unconscious pile.

  ###

  Strangely, it was Grant's father who came to her. After the way she'd disowned him, how could he possibly care about her? Back in college she'd stopped taking his calls, never answered his letters. Not even the ones he'd written on his deathbed. She'd kept the letters, but for the first few years, she never reread them. She'd kept them like one might keep old legal documents, papers that may or may not ever be referenced again. But in the last few years, she'd started to reread the letters every so often. They made her sad because she realized how much she missed and loved him.

  And right now her father seemed to be here, his voice in her head was emphatic and loud. “Break free!” It was a command, not a request. When she was a headstrong, highly opinionated teen, he would gently urge her to break free of rigid judgments that seemed to allow little tolerance of her parents.

  “Break free!”

  Obeying the command, Grant brought her palms together at her waist, laced her fingers together, and then raised her hands forcefully, straight up. Her laced fingers were like a double fist that cracked into the bottom of the technician's chin and rocked his head back. He loosened his grip, but when she forced her arms open wide, the move broke his grip entirely. She delivered a sharp blow from her flat right hand—a judo chop—to his throat, and he collapsed to the floor, retching.

  She gulped down air, rubbed her neck, and surveyed the room. Her perception returned to normal speed, but she was now possessed with a strange serenity. She reached into her purse, found the gun she'd gotten from Ma, and crossed to the door, which was again closed. She saw Zhao through the small, broken window. And he saw her. Zhao fired, Grant fired, and then he turned tail and ran back out into the hall, leaving the bodies of Ma and Oi Lam on the changing room floor.

  She turned to Hernandez. He lay flat on his back, but was strangling Lin with a black keyboard cable. Gritting his teeth, his face a mask of grim determination, Hernandez pulled the cord tighter. Lin's feet kicked at empty air, his eyes popped out like a gasping frog, and then he died. Hernandez rolled the big man off him. He looked up at Nicole as blood ran down his cheek.

  In an unspoken union of concern, they both looked at the countdown clock: 02:47

  ###

  Kate Rice ducked through a service entrance of the Grand Hyatt and took a rear stairway up several flights before picking up an elevator. One swipe of her magnetic key card and the door opened into her darkened hotel suite. The main room was as still as a church on Monday morning. She couldn’t be certain whether Chinese or Agency killers were already after her, but held her suppressed Boberg semi-auto as she silently checked the main room. Everything appeared undisturbed, so she slithered into the bedroom.

  A splash of awareness hit her like a hot shower suddenly turning cold. A killer was here. Somewhere in her hotel suite. A shiver ran up her arm as the fuzz on the back of her neck stood up. Rice felt tingly, but wasn't afraid. No lights were on in the suite, but ambient light from a city blazing with them filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows in the bedroom and living rooms. No one was in the bedroom and no one had been in the main room. That left the bathroom. The half-closed doorway was only a few steps away.

  A lighting control panel for the entire suite was recessed in the wall next to the bed. Rice trained her gun on the bathroom doorway, crouched down, reached over, and pushed a button causing the bathroom light to come on.

  Now who's scared?

  She grabbed a pillow from the bed, keeping her gun leveled. The plush carpet underfoot gave away no creaks. Stalking a killer wasn't in her job description, but Rice was a hands-on operator. Hyper-alive with certainty that the advantage was all hers, she silently closed in and flung the pillow hard at the partially open door.

  Two soft puffts and the sounds of wood splintering as two shots from a suppressed automatic blew holes in the wooden bathroom door. Rice answered six times as she moved forward, firing her equally quiet
weapon. Six 9mm slugs tore through the door and then three more for good measure as she kicked at the disintegrating wood. Something heavy crashed to the floor.

  Rice stormed in as Socorro Trujillo crumbled to the floor, limbs akimbo. She'd been shot multiple times but still managed to raise her suppressed handgun. Without missing a beat Rice kicked the gun away, bent down and placed the tip of her suppressor against the woman's forehead.

  Trujillo's mouth was open as she tried to suck in air. Her glassy black eyes displayed the shock of realization that her life span now numbered in mere seconds.

  “Who do you work for?”

  “Take a guess,” gasped Trujillo, weakly.

  “What are your orders regarding me?”

  “You're a dead bitch walking.” Trujillo's lips curled into a snarl.

  The woman was a pro and had real balls. Rice took satisfaction in having bested her. “You're a dead bitch in a toilet.” Rice pulled the trigger. Time to get far away from Hong Kong.

  ###

  Hernandez looked bad and felt worse as he sat on the floor of the control room of the supercomputer Tianhe-2. His shoulder burned and his suit jacket around the gunshot wound was soaked with blood. He touched his face--half of it was sticky and red from the graze to his scalp and from the bloody nose Lin had given him. He felt weak and fatigued, but there was no time to rest. Grant stood at the door holding a gun. He stood on wobbly legs and crossed to her.

  “Zhao is out there in the hallway.”

  Hernandez nodded, chanced a quick look out, and immediately came under fire. “Get down!” he said, pushing her clear. As she scrambled away he stood there trading fire with Zhao. He tossed the empty Kimber aside, then fired the last bullet from the Type 67 silenced pistol and tossed it aside. He retrieved the last pistol from his fanny pack, and fired three times at Zhao.