The Forgotten

by David Baldacci

  This was not a movie where he could Matrix his way to victory. It would be fearful men fighting, making mistakes but certainly landing some blows.

  Puller tipped the scales at well over two hundred pounds. The men he would be facing tonight collectively weighed about a thousand pounds. They had twelve fists and a dozen legs to his two and two.

  Six against one, hand-to-hand, no matter how good you were or how inept the six were, would likely result in defeat. Puller could take out three or four rather quickly. But the remaining two or three men would probably get in a lucky shot and possibly knock him down. And then it would be over. Bats and bars would rain down on him and then a gunshot would end it all.

  If one had a choice—and sometimes one did —a truly superb close-quarters fighter only fought when the conditions favored him.

  He didn’t have much time, because they would quickly determine that he was not in the room. Then they would do one of two things: leave and come back, or set a trap and wait for him. And a trap would involve a perimeter. At least he was counting on that, because a perimeter meant that the six men would have to divide their forces.

  Then six became four, or three, two, or even one.

  Divide and conquer.

  That was the condition on the ground that Puller needed in order to win. And it would be even better if his adversaries tonight provided it for him. Something told him they would.

  A well-thought-out perimeter could defeat most plans to pierce it. A few moments later he could see that this perimeter was not well thought out. And so it would be pierced rather easily.

  The two men were standing in the middle of the hall. They had taken no measures to conceal their presence. One had a bat, the other a gun. They were talking in low tones, looking smug, confident. The man holding the bat spun it like a baton. The man with the gun held it loosely, pointed down. Four fingers were clasped around the butt of the weapon, his index finger not even near the trigger guard.

  In other words, the weapons were useless.

  The men didn’t react until the bat was taken from the first man. A blow to his stomach from the head of the bat sent him pitching to the floor. The second man raised his gun, but did not fire it because he was no longer holding it.

  Puller, holding the pistol by the muzzle, brought the butt of the weapon around and crushed it against the man’s temple. He went down to join his buddy on the ragged carpet covered in puke stains. A tap from the bat on the writhing first man’s head was all that was needed to stop the writhing.

  The attack had taken all of five seconds. Puller had swung the bat at almost the same time he had stripped the gun from the other man. The only sounds had come from bodies falling to the floor.

  Puller crouched there, the bat in one hand, his other hand around his Mu. He had dropped the other pistol after removing the mag and clearing the chamber of the loaded round. He did not like firing other people’s weapons. A badly maintained gun could be more dangerous to the one firing it than to the one being fired on.

  He counted off a few seconds in his head. Two down, four to go. His room was around the comer. These jackasses had been the front line. He figured perhaps one man at another barrier and then three at ground zero to finish the job.

  He crab-walked to the corner, did a turkey peek, and drew back. Here the darkness was near total because someone had removed the overhead lights.

  Nice tactic, he thought. But with his goggles darkness was preferable.

  Halfway down the hall, in a shadow that was deeper than the surrounding darkness, was stationed the third man. He was crouched in a narrow alcove. Gun, bat, or metal bar would be his weapon. Puller had several options. He could bull-rush and reach the man before he could react. Or he could approach with stealth, take the man down quietly, and move on.

  He opted for the latter.

  Slithering on his belly like he had through Florida swamps and Iraqi sands in his career as a Ranger, Puller moved forward. He knew the crouching man would be looking at a point parallel to his eye level and then upward. It was just human nature. Only trained personnel would finish off the imaginary vertical line from floor to ceiling, knowing full well that an experienced attacker could come at you from virtually any angle. And the most obvious angle was never the most popular.

  He drew within a foot of the other man. Puller was looking up, the other man still swiveling his gaze in an uneven arc. When he looked away from Puller the bat came up and the man went down, blood running from his head. The scalp bled like a bitch. And the accompanying headache, when the man awoke, would be one he would never forget.

  He had not hit any of the three men tonight hard enough to kill them. Puller knew how much force was required to crack skulls. He had not minded applying that force to men who raped women in front of their little brothers. But these men tonight were just the revenge crew. They might actually be as bad as or worse than the ones Puller had already beaten up. But he would cut them a little slack. They would live to spread the message that to leave him alone was the smart money.

  This man had held the metal bar. Puller retrieved it and kept going.

  Three down and three to go. The odds were much better. In fact, they had returned to the same ones he had dealt with in the stairwell. And the three men he had disabled were the members of the revenge crew, which meant the men up ahead were the rapist crew. The same ones who had no doubt come back and beaten up Isabel and little Mateo.

  Puller decided to up the level of force he was about to bring.

  He moved quickly down the hall. The door to his room was slightly ajar. He shook his head at the tactics employed by the opposition. A partially open door was like waving a red flag and screaming, “We’re in here waiting for you.”

  So you wouldn’t go in. You would move to the room next door and try to surprise them through the connecting portal. But of course the surprise would be all yours as they blew you away.

  He envisioned them grouped around the connecting door, but he doubted their attention would be all that focused. For Puller to get that far their perimeter would have to have been defeated almost soundlessly. They would imagine this could never happen. They had chosen to be the rear guard tonight because they had hoped that Puller would never make it this far. They did not want another encounter with him. What sane person would, after the beating they had endured?

  For all he knew they would be playing cards, or banging back beers to get up their courage, or smoking cigarettes, or peering out the lone window. Anything but being professional.

  He hit the door to his room so hard that it broke off the hinges. There were two shapes directly in front of him. As he had thought, they were clustered around the connecting door. The metal bar took out both with one swing. White dropped onto the bed. This time he might very well be dead. Black was flung through the window, shattering the glass, and dangled there, half in and half out.

  Now Latino was the only one left.

  He was in the far corner of the room, looking ready to shit his pants. He had his gun out. He was at most six feet from Puller. In the dark and with his adrenaline spiking and turning fine motor skills to zero, it might as well have been six miles.

  He fired once and missed by five feet.

  He did not get a chance to fire a second time.

  The first blow knocked the gun from his hand.

  The second blow knocked him off his feet. The third blow left no doubt that the fight was done.

  As Puller rose, his breath already starting to relax, he sensed it.

  Light.

  Body heat.

  Sweat.

  Eyes on him.

  From the connecting doorway.

  He looked.

  Two small men there. Both Latinos. Armed. Both pointing compact nines right at his head. Two guns could not miss at this distance.

  The rear guard he had not accounted for. Eight men had come tonight.

  Not six.

  He had screwed up in an unforgivable way. The penal
ty for that was crystal clear.

  He was dead.

  CHAPTER 32

  It was the first time Puller had seen men fly without benefit of an aircraft.

  Or so it seemed.

  Their feet left the floor like they were attached to piano wire and someone had just hit a switch, lifting them skyward.

  The next moment their heads collided. The sound was like a pair of cantaloupes smacking against one another. Puller could see the sensation of the violent collision spread to their eyes and mouths. The eyes winced, rolled in their heads, and then closed. The mouths opened wide, cries of pain came out of them, and then they closed, like the eyes. But unlike the eyes they closed only for a moment. Then they sagged open, even as their bodies became dead weight and they dropped to the floor. They hit it hard, guns skidding away. Blood pooled from their open mouths where teeth had cut deeply into tongues.

  Standing behind the two small men was the giant, the man Puller had seen twice before. It seemed that the rear guard had done the unforgivable. They had used the giant’s room as their staging area without his permission. That was the only reason Puller could fathom for the man doing what he had done.

  He straightened and stared at the giant. Puller’s Mu twitched in his hand. The giant was unarmed but still looked uncomfortably lethal and completely unafraid as he stood there, staring back at Puller.

  Puller said, “Thanks.”

  The giant said nothing. He glanced once at Puller’s sidearm, as though gauging whether this was a threat that needed to be dealt with now. Then he put one enormous boot on the torso of the first man and pushed. The man’s body slid into the room Puller was in. A moment later another push sent the other man sliding into the room.

  The giant looked at Puller.

  Puller looked at the giant.

  Til try to keep things more quiet,” said Puller.

  Puller thought he saw a hint of a smile before the giant closed the door to his room. A few moments later Puller could hear the screech of sagging bedsprings. The giant was apparently going to sleep after this minor interruption.

  Puller holstered his weapon but pulled it again in an instant, found his target, and prepared to fire.

  “It’s me! It’s me!”

  Cheryl Landry held her gun up in a surrender position.

  Puller slowly lowered his Mu and lifted up his goggles.

  “Sorry.”

  She gazed around at the mess of humanity that lay sprawled around his room.

  “Shit, Puller. What the hell did you do? There are three more laid out in the hall.”

  “I just take them on as they come.” He hol- stered his gun.

  “You were smart to call me. Sorry I didn’t get here in time.”

  “I could’ve waited, but that was my call. Nothing you could have done.”

  “Why didn’t you wait,” she said, pouncing on this admission, “until I got here?”

  “My fight. No need for you to get involved except in the cleanup.”

  “Do I translate that as meaning you didn’t think I could hold my own?”

  “You’re a cop, Landry. If we had fought these clowns together you’d be doing paperwork the rest of your life to explain the whys and hows. And then your career would still be in the toilet. But for that I would have no problem with you backing me up. And believe me, I don’t make such a statement lightly.”

  She seemed both put off and mollified by this statement. She slid her weapon into her belt holster. She was not in uniform. She had on jeans, black-soled tennis shoes, and a gray hoodie with a sliver of black T-shirt revealed underneath.

  He watched as she counted off in her head. Five here, three in the hall, he interpreted.

  She looked up at him incredulously.

  “You took out eight guys all by yourself?” She noted the guns, bats, and metal bar. “And they were armed?”

  Puller’s gaze shifted for one millisecond to the sounds of snoring coming from the next room. The giant had dropped off fast. But something told him the man could awaken and kill any attacker within a pair of seconds. He decided it would be much too complicated to bring him into the discussion with Landry.

  He said, “They were eight stupid guys. Armed has nothing to do with it, if you don’t give yourself a chance to use your weapons.”

  “You said it was three guys who were attacking the girl earlier?”

  Puller nodded and pointed to White, Black, and Latino. “These three idiots here. The girl is too scared to press charges. But I’ll be glad to. They weren’t here to welcome me back to my room. Attempted murder at least.” He paused. “And I doubt they have permits for those guns. You know any of them?”

  Landry pulled a small but powerful light from her hoodie pocket and shined it on each of the fallen men.

  She nodded. “These two, yeah,” she said, indicating Black and White. “They don’t belong to any gangs that I’m aware of. But they’ve got a rap sheet with us.”

  “I heard they were too dumb and unreliable to be of any use to a gang.”

  “Where did you hear that from?”

  “Confidential source.”

  “You’ve been here a little over twelve hours. Where do you get confidential sources that fast?” “You work at it.”

  “I’m going to call for transport on this.” “Okay.”

  “Paperwork to fill out.”

  “I bet.”

  “It can wait until morning.”

  “Appreciate that.”

  “You got another place to stay?”

  Puller thought about this. His aunt’s house was an option. But right now he considered it an unprocessed crime scene. His moving in there, even for a night, could potentially foul up some important evidence. He couldn’t bring himself to do that, even if it was more convenient for him personally.

  “My car.”

  “TheVette?”

  “No. Another set of wheels. Figured the Vette was too conspicuous.”

  “I’d agree with that.“

  “So I can sleep in my vehicle.”

  “On the street?”

  “Why, don’t you keep them safe?”

  “Puller, you just beat the crap out of eight guys who live in Paradise. I’m sure all eight have friends and family who might want a little revenge. They’ll be looking for you, whether you’re in a car or in another cheap motel.”

  “Well, I can rent a blanket and lie out on the beach.”

  “You’re not getting my point. They could come and kill you.”

  “You got any suggestions, then? I’m fresh out of ideas.”

  Landry looked uncertain, and then she looked uncomfortable. Her changing features piqued Puller’s interest. He wondered what she would say.

  “Look, you can stay at my place. Just for tonight,” she added quickly.

  “You in Paradise?”

  “Just next door in Destin.”

  “You don’t care to live in Paradise?”

  “I like the view in Destin better. Besides, it’s only fifteen minutes away. But it’s an important fifteen minutes. For you. I doubt the friends and family will find you there.”

  “You don’t have to put me up.”

  “I know I don’t. I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t want to.”

  “You don’t really know me.”

  “I told you my brother’s in the Army. He checked you out for me. Said there’s not an enlisted with a better record in the service. The only knock against you is why you didn’t go to West Point. And my brother said your father was like Patton and Schwarzkopf rolled into one.”

  “I wouldn’t disagree with that. Although he probably rotates closer to Patton, at least in his bedside manner.”

  “So you’ll stay at my place?”

  “Okay, just for the night.”

  “Just for the night,” she repeated and then slipped her phone out and called for police and medical transport for eight men who’d had the shit kicked out of them.

  After she finished a
nd put her phone away she said, “Bullock will