A Touch of Malice

by Gary Ponzo

  “Manny,” Moreno’s big voice boomed over the phone. “Are you listening to me?”

  “Every word.” Padilla strangled the phone in his hand, while a slow drizzle began to drop from the treetops in clumps.

  “Good. How is the American?”

  Padilla walked to the prisoner’s tent surrounded by five of his soldiers. He pulled back the mosquito netting and found the American staring at the ground in the darkened quarters with his splint torn apart. He was hobbling around, leaving a trail of blood behind. The ants were attracted to the scent and he was attempting to stay one step ahead of the carnivorous creatures. The man was stumbling around because of his wounded leg, but it was obvious he was deliriously exhausted and would not be ambulatory for very much longer.

  “He is still alive,” Padilla said, flatly.

  “Manny, it will be good for business if he remains that way for the next twenty-four hours.”

  The American prisoner meant nothing to him. As a matter of fact, because it was so important to Moreno, Padilla was more determined than ever to administer a slow torturous death.

  “Yes, of course, El Patron. We will assure that he survives one more day.”

  “Good. I am moving some of my men to the lake. The Americans will be sending a small team of spies to attempt to rescue him. Once they are dead we’ll move the American back here. I will call when it is done.”

  Moreno said “my men” as if Padilla had no ownership over them. Here he was being the good soldier, saturated to the bone from humidity and it still wasn’t “our men.” It would always be Moreno’s men and it made Padilla feel good about his decisions to pilfer product from the man.

  “I will wait,” was all Padilla could say.

  “Good,” Moreno said, then hung up.

  Had the conversation lasted another minute, Padilla was certain he would have erupted into the phone and that would not have been smart. Padilla needed to be smart one more day, then he would make it to his millions and leave this bug-infested jungle forever.

  Now he could see the American fall to the floor and roll to his side, desperately trying to get to his feet, but not making it. Padilla enjoyed watching the man struggle for survival. It was the one piece of entertainment he had while confined to his waterlogged detention.

  The man had insulted Padilla and he would now pay for it with a long torturous death. No one insulted Manny Padilla and got away with it.

  Not even the brother to the President of the United States.

  * * *

  Walt Jackson had his tie pulled down six inches with the top button of his shirt opened and his sleeves rolled up. As he paced in front of the wall of TV monitors, he kept his headset turned down to hear the other members of the team in his office. There were sandwich wrappers and empty coffee cups scattered across table tops and counters throughout the room.

  Stevie Gilpin would occasionally grab an empty container and toss it in the trash as it encroached his space behind Walt’s desk. Now, he rubbed his tired eyes as he examined the topography of the Amazon Rainforest on the ultra-thin computer screen.

  “I’m needing some eye drops,” Stevie said.

  Walt pushed a button on his phone and spoke into his wireless headset. “Grace, could you have someone run to the drug store and purchase some eye drops please.”

  “Sure,” Grace said.

  Faust jumped up from his place on the couch and snapped his fingers for attention with his phone to his ear.

  “It’s a call from a safe house in Homs, Syria,” Faust announced. He pushed a button on his phone, then placed it on Walt’s desk. Instantly a panicky voice came screaming out of the speaker in mid-sentence.

  “—with two snipers on the roof waiting instructions,” the voice said.

  Martin Riggs was on his feet staring at a report on his cell phone. “I just received a request for military support from that annex.”

  Riggs stood over Faust’s phone. “How many—”

  “Incoming mortar fire now,” the voice interrupted.

  Muted explosions could be heard over the phone.

  “How many insurgents,” Riggs repeated.

  “A dozen. Maybe more.”

  “All right,” Riggs said, “hold on.” He moved to the back of Walt’s office with his cell phone to his ear.

  Walt and Louis let the CIA control the situation, careful not to step on any toes.

  “Where are your snipers?” Faust asked.

  “On the roof. Two of them.”

  A steady flow of machine-gun fire was muffling the conversation. Faust leaned over the phone and spoke louder. “Do they have position?”

  “Yes , sir.”

  Riggs returned with determination in his eyes. He joined Faust over the phone.

  “Delta Force Twelve will be there in twenty minutes,” Riggs said into the phone.

  There was a lengthy pause where just outbursts of machine guns and shouting could be heard.

  “Shit,” Faust yelled. “Did you hear that?”

  “Sir,” the voice said. “We won’t make it that long. Snipers have visual contact. Lasers in place. Request permission to fire.”

  “Yes,” both Faust and Riggs shouted simultaneously.

  “Sir, the insurgents,” the voice stammered. “The insurgents are young. Some appearing less than ten, sir.”

  “Crap,” Riggs muttered.

  “Repeat. Request permission to fire,” the voice yelled a little louder this time.

  Walt watched the action with his hand clenched. In this politically correct environment they all resided in, every action needed to be viewed with the aftereffect in mind. People’s careers would be decided by the decisions that were made on a daily basis. With the amount of action Martin Riggs had seen in his time in the Marines, then as the secretary of defense, you would think he’d be numb to it all, but that wasn’t the case. Above all, Riggs valued human life and used military force with patience rarely seen at his level.

  Riggs looked at Faust. “What time is it over there?”

  Faust looked at his watch. “Nine-thirty.”

  “Damn.” Riggs leaned over the desk, palms down, staring at the phone with an expression of indignity. Faust began to speak, but Riggs held up his hand to stop him. Once a Marine, always a Marine. He was going to make the call, no one else.

  “Have them take out the oldest ones first,” Riggs said. “See if that scatters the rest.”

  “Yes, sir,” came the voice.

  They could hear the orders being transmitted to the snipers while the gunfire continued.

  Riggs remained hung over the desk as if preventing it from taking flight. He looked over at Stevie. “Any drones in the area?”

  “No, sir,” Stevie replied. “I already checked. We have one over the southern territory, but farther away than Delta Force.”

  They waited, listening to the cacophony of gunfire as if the crescendo might cease momentarily. When it persisted, Faust roamed his eyes around the room finally landing on Walt.

  “Are they in the air yet?” Faust asked, switching his attention to the Colombian rescue mission.

  Walt simply nodded.

  The gunfire subsided to intervals instead of constants.

  “Sir,” the voice said over the speakerphone. “We’re losing our position. One sniper has been hit.”

  It was the risk everyone in the room knew existed. Because it was nighttime over there, the snipers’ muzzle flashes made them instant targets within the first few shots they took. Now, they were taking on fire from the exposed position of an open rooftop. Riggs gambled that the younger militants would fall back once their more experienced fighters were taken out. In this case, it only fueled their anger.

  “Sir?” the voice said.

  Riggs stared at the phone as if he could see the battle right before his eyes. “Permission to retaliate has been granted,” Riggs said with a clenched jaw. “Take them out.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The gunfire instant
ly began to whittle down as the young inexperienced insurgents were eliminated one by one. After a few moments, the smattering of shots became just one single gunshot.

  Then complete silence.

  A minute passed.

  The voice on the phone said, “All clear.”

  “How is the sniper?” Faust asked.

  “Everyone is accounted for, sir. Hodge needs medical attention, but he’ll survive.”

  “Delta Force will be there momentarily,” Riggs said. “When they secure the area, have everyone evacuated.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

  “No.” Riggs hung his head and closed his eyes. “Thank you.”

  Faust pushed the off button.

  When the calamity ended, the stillness returned. The only noise was the sound of Stevie’s fingers banging on the keypad. They were flying furiously while he craned his neck closer to the twenty-one-inch computer screen, squinting hard, then finally a satisfied grin spread across his face.

  “What have you got?” Walt asked.

  Stevie stopped typing. He leaned back in his chair and clasped his hand over his stomach. “I think I know where they are.”

  Chapter 19

  Nick, Matt, Kalinikov and the three SEALs had just reached cruising altitude in the Department of Justice’s 747. The middle of the fuselage had been specifically designed for on-board meetings. One long row of chairs was lined up against the port windows in a semicircle, facing the long row of seats against the windows across the open space between them.

  The three SEALs sat together rubbing sticks of greenish black paint all over their exposed skin. Their hands, their wrists, their necks and every inch of their face. The color was chosen to blend in with the precise environment they would be traversing.

  Nick and the rest of the crew were waiting their turn with the paint when the call came from the command center in Walt’s office.

  “Hey,” Nick answered his phone. “What took so long?”

  “We had a situation in Syria,” Walt said, leaving it at that. “Stevie thinks he found the Camenos camp, however. Put us on the overhead speaker system so the team can hear this.”

  Nick stood to place the phone into the cradle, but wobbled a bit as the plane jostled through clear air turbulence. The cradle was bolted onto a secure table just below a fifty-nine-inch computer monitor which hung from the ceiling. The phone was then connected to the airplane’s speaker system so the entire team could hear the call. Once the phone was in place, he turned up the volume and said, “We’re ready.”

  “Good,” came Walt’s voice over the speakers. “Now, turn on the computer so he can point out the coordinates.”

  Nick turned on the computer sitting next to the receiver. A moment later, the monitor flashed through its routine startup mode. After a minute, Nick clicked the mouse onto the “Connect Me” icon and waited for the cursor to begin moving on its own, signaling Stevie’s takeover of the controls.

  “I’ve got it,” Stevie proclaimed over the speakers.

  “Proceed,” Nick said, stooping over and shutting the nearby window shades to darken the interior of the plane.

  On the screen was an enlarged photo of a satellite image of the Amazon Rainforest. A wall of green without any distinguishing features as far as Nick could tell.

  “So here’s the area we’ve been investigating,” Stevie said. The cursor swung around the image in a random pattern. “We reduced this search to a ten-square-mile circumference. Since this area receives eighty inches of rainfall a year, it made sense they would set up on high ground, which I will highlight now.”

  Portions of the screen turned dark blue, highlighting the elevated topography of the region. There were over a dozen sections outlined on the image.

  “Now,” Stevie continued, “I examined every inch of these images and couldn’t find any distinguishing features. Finally, after exhausting my checklist of anomalies and coming up empty, I figured they would want to be close to fresh water, so I used the passive microwave imager to measure soil moisture.”

  The highlighted sections dissipated until there were only five separate blue spots left.

  “That’s when I noticed this,” Stevie said with a jolt of enthusiasm in his voice. The cursor made a slow circle around one of the highlighted blue spots. “This, my friends is a concentric body of water surrounding this raised land.”

  Nick knew right away the significance. “Yes, very good, Stevie.”

  “What am I missing?” Matt said, working his leg into a new jungle boot.

  “It is man-made,” Kalinikov answered, then looked at Nick and both of them seemed to understand together.

  “Exactly,” Stevie remarked. “A moat of some sort. From my moisture sensor, it looks like twenty yards wide.”

  “So people can’t swim twenty yards?” Matt cracked.

  “It will be filled with Piranha,” Kalinikov said.

  “Possibly,” Stevie said. “My guess is it will have other poisonous creatures. It might even be electrified.”

  “There will be a crank in the camp to raise and lower the submerged bridge,” Nick said. “It’s an old jungle tactic from the early Spanish explorers. They would stake their claim on high ground, then protect themselves with the natural resources around them.”

  Nick could feel Kalinikov staring at him.

  “You are very perceptive, Agent Bracco,” Kalinikov remarked.

  The compliment made Nick feel a little dirty somehow. He still hadn’t been comfortable with the merger and wasn’t sure how to take the praise. Maybe it was admiration. Maybe respect. Maybe Nick was being played. His trust level had diminished over the years and he could tell by Matt’s demeanor, his partner had his ears up as well.

  “I studied South American history in college,” Nick said.

  Kalinikov grinned. “I studied Kalashnikov’s.”

  “You two would make a great comedy team with that kind of education,” Matt said.

  Nick shot his partner a look.

  “Let’s stay on task,” Walt’s voice boomed over the speakers.

  “Yes, Dad,” Matt said, cutting up the tension the only way he knew how.

  “Now, once you’re inside the jungle, the GPS will be sporadic at best, so you’ll have to rely on your compass to locate the camp.”

  “Understood,” Nick answered.

  “From your drop point, you should be less than five miles away,” Stevie said.

  “That could take quite a while in that environment,” Walt added. “Hours. Make sure you’re prepared for ambushes. Matt, that’s your job. Put that Special Forces training to use.”

  “Roger,” Matt said.

  “There’s one other thing,” Walt said. “We need to find a weakness in Pablo Moreno’s operation. We need to find a way to pressure him into keeping Trent alive. He’s not a government official so we can’t use the normal diplomatic channels. We need something personal. Something . . . unique.”

  Nick looked around the inside of the plane and acknowledged the one person who was missing from their team. “It’s all right, Walt. I’ve got someone on that.”

  When Nick didn’t offer a name, Walt unabashedly said, “Tommy?”

  “Yes.” Nick grinned. The cat was now out of the bag and it appeared neither Walt nor anyone else in the command center cared. They were all working together to save the president’s brother and anyone who helped that cause was on their team.

  Even an ex-KGB assassin who may or may not have his own agenda.

  “Hey, Nick,” Stevie said. “There’ll be a lot of precipitation down there so try to keep my equipment dry as best you can.”

  “How about this exit strategy,” Nick said.

  “Your satellite phones probably won’t work under that jungle canopy, so you’ll need to find an opening to get a signal. When you get to their camp, they’ll have something installed to boost the signal. Once you have Trent, call or text. The choppers will be there within twenty minutes. They probably w
on’t have a place to land, so you’ll need to find a sliver of an opening for them.”

  “Okay,” Nick said. He looked around the plane. “Anyone have questions?”

  No one spoke. They knew what they had to do and like the alpha males they all were, there wasn’t need to discuss the obstacles they faced.

  “All right, then,” Nick said. “I need to make a quick call.” He moved to the back of the plane and grabbed an empty seat facing the rescue team. They were finishing off their face paint and cleaning their guns.

  Nick only waited two rings until a young child answered, “Mama.”

  “Thomas, it’s Da Da,” Nick said, beaming from hearing his son’s voice.

  “Mama.”

  There was a pause, then, “Hi sweetie,” Julie said. “I saw it was you so I thought I’d have him answer.”

  “I’m glad you did.”

  “How are things going? Almost there?”

  “Almost. We’ll be pulling in around midnight.”

  “Then you’ll be home the next day?”

  “Yes, sweetie. It’ll all be over very quick.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “Yes, well,” Julie didn’t need to finish the statement. It was the same conversation they had anytime Nick left for an assignment. Except this time there was a different feel to it. Even their normal dialogue seemed stilted somehow.

  Nick filled the empty space with, “You want to know what I’m thinking about right now?”

  “What?”

  Nick lowered his voice even though he was too far to be heard. “I’m thinking of how warm your body feels when you’re fast asleep. How soft the back of your neck is to kiss.”

  Silence. Nothing but the hum of four airplane engines chewing up the atmosphere as they cruised over the Caribbean.

  “Do you want to know what I’m thinking about right now?” Julie answered in a no-nonsense voice.

  Nick squeezed his eyes shut in preparation. “What?”