Hunter Killer

by Brad Taylor

  “Why?”

  “Because the man our bosses have been working with was the ex-president. He was running for another term, and leading handily, meaning all we had to do was get rid of a few Petrobras sticks, replacing them with someone of a more Carwash bent. But he was just informed he can’t run for president anymore, even though we’re within sight of the election.”

  “Why?”

  Dmitri laughed and said, “Because he was sent to jail for corruption. You can’t make that up. He was winning the election from jail, but the high court said he is ineligible while serving his sentence. So the party put up someone else, and he’s miles behind this man.”

  Dmitri stabbed a finger into the picture on the table and said, “A firebrand that came out of nowhere, whose entire platform is getting rid of corruption. So, naturally, we can’t have that. We need the stand-in to win. Which means we need to get rid of any competition. Can you do it?”

  Nikita ran his hands through his hair, thinking of the implications. And the rewards. He said, “Yes, I can. But it’ll be costly.”

  Dmitri laughed and said, “Of course. But costly for whom? Surely you don’t expect my hands on this, do you? I gave you the clean passports, and I pay your salary.”

  Nikita drew back and said, “That’s not what I meant. I mean it’ll be costly to get it done in the timeline you envision. The election is in two weeks. Not a lot of time to plan, but money can overcome some of that.”

  Dmitri pulled out a bottle of vodka and two glasses, saying, “You will have the money. And I was joking earlier. You will have the protection as well. This comes from the highest place. It’s not about oil fields. It’s about influence. NATO takes over one country after another in our near abroad, and now it’s time to return the favor for the United States. The idiots in Brazil helping us have no idea, just as the Crimean Peninsula didn’t.”

  “So this is about more than money?”

  “It’s always about more than money. We’re altering the election of a sovereign state not for the profit of cash, but the profit of influence.”

  “But the United States is aware of our actions in the past. Even the Europeans are aware of election meddling. Something this overt will be challenged, and quite possibly backfire.”

  “The Europeans don’t care, and as for the Americans, we have a company that’s helping shape Brazilian opinion. One that’s well placed in the political establishment. It’s one more bit of Kompromat to use. If this goes bad, the company will want to distance itself from their efforts, and they’ll use their own levers of power to do so with the United States. It’s a win-win.”

  Incredulous, Nikita said, “You have a United States company working on Operation Harvest? How on earth can you not be sure they aren’t penetrated?”

  “They work for profit. Not ideology. And they work in the world of social media manipulation for the election. They’ve done it all over the world, and all they know is that they’ve been hired to support a candidate from Brazil. They don’t know the hand behind the payment.”

  “That’s not good enough. Have you screened them? I mean individual members.”

  “Yes, of course. If it’ll make you more at ease, the owner emigrated from the Soviet Union, much like the president of Google. While I’d love to have Google in my pocket, this company will do. They have their hand in the politics of the United States, and are also the ones who established the investment fund that got you the Saint Kitts passports. They make a profit with that as well—and not just to us, although we certainly leverage it.”

  Nikita took that in, and realized he wasn’t going to win a fight about trust, even if it was his ass on the line. He either took the mission or he didn’t, but there remained an outstanding threat.

  “What about the men still in Brazil? The ones from Grolier Recovery Services that Luca and Simon identified? They’re still running about.”

  “They’re not a threat. They should be flying home as soon as they hear their boss is dead.”

  “If it’s like you say, I’d rather not rely on hope that they do so.”

  Dmitri poured two shots of vodka, hoisted his glass, and said, “I guess that’ll mean upping the target deck to six. But I wouldn’t worry too much about it. They can’t fight without a leader.”

  Chapter 6

  I squeezed the handset, wanting to throw the phone against the wall. I could tell I wasn’t winning the argument. George Wolffe, the deputy commander of the Taskforce, did not want to hear what I had to say.

  “Sir, all I’m asking for is some computer work on the video I have. I’m not asking to start hacking into U.S. systems.”

  “Pike, you yourself said that the fire marshal called the explosion a natural event, and the damn ATF backed up their assessment.”

  Which was true, but there was no way what had happened to Kurt was a coincidence. The ATF didn’t look hard enough, which is why I wanted the video analyzed. After all, if the ATF knew what we really did for a living, they’d be digging deep into about forty different terrorist groups. They didn’t, and so that left me.

  I had just driven the Jeep to the store before tossing the keys to Kurt, and everything had been working fine. If the fuel line were leaking like they said, collecting in a puddle, wouldn’t it have registered somehow? Wouldn’t I have seen a stain on the stone, or felt something out of whack? Or did it just happen that day? I realized that the cause the ATF and fire marshal blamed had to start sometime—and today was just as good as any other—but in the back of my mind, there was no way I could make sense of the fact that my personal vehicle had killed my commander—and my friend. It had to be something else.

  I said, “Sir, they did say that, but they also said their finding was just a guess due to the damage. They can’t determine conclusively, and they aren’t looking based on our answers about enemies and threats against us. We told them the cover story and backed off. Someone needs to investigate that isn’t a threat to our cover. That’s what I’m trying to do.”

  “They determined conclusively that there was no malicious interference. The rest is just speculation. Look, I get where you’re coming from, but we have enough on our plate right now just covering who Kurt really was and why he was there. Let’s deal with that right now.”

  Kurt held two jobs: one as the CEO of Blaisdell Consulting, aka the commander of Project Prometheus, and another his “real job” working on the Joint Staff as a colonel in the United States Army. His death on my lawn was causing a headache, because now the national command authority had to publicly state why a staff officer from the Pentagon was killed at a house in Charleston, South Carolina. And they had to do so without involving Grolier Recovery Services, because the thread was there to pull by any conspiracy buff who wanted to find it.

  I said, “His niece was my nanny. He was visiting, period. That should hold up and it’s no reason to deny my request.”

  I could hear the exasperation coming through the phone, George wanting to placate me, but not wanting to go where I wanted. “Pike, it’s not going to happen. The entire Taskforce is on stand-down. We’re in uncharted territory here, and we need to prevent any exposure. That’s the mission.”

  “Sir, that’s my point! If this was a targeted hit, then we are exposed. Someone knew enough to find out where I live and to target me. They didn’t do it because I dig up pottery shards with Jennifer. They did it because I work for the Taskforce.”

  I heard him take a breath, then, “Pike, I know this hurts. It hurts everyone, trust me, but you of all people know that sometimes bad things just happen. It doesn’t make it a conspiracy. Two people pedaling by your house thirty minutes before Kurt died does not make this a targeted hit. More importantly to the discussion, how did your interactions with the police go?”

  The video I wanted the Taskforce computer geeks to analyze was from my home’s surveillance cameras. After the explosion—after I’d raced out of the house in a futile attempt to save Kurt’s life, and after the nightmar
e of police vehicles and fire trucks—I’d reviewed the DVR footage and seen nothing except two males biking down the street. Something that was completely ordinary in Charleston. But I didn’t want it to be.

  I said, “I didn’t talk to the police. I’m camped out at our office. Jennifer’s handling the police conversations, and we’re good. She gave them the story about Kylie and it’s set in stone. No reason to go looking anywhere else. She told them I’m out of town.”

  “Why? Why did you flee the damn scene? That’s going to look like you’re hiding something.”

  “Because someone tried to kill me, and I want them to think I’m dead.”

  “Damn it, Pike, you’re going to cause the very thing we’re trying to prevent!”

  I heard nothing but breathing for a moment, then, “Okay, look, find a way to get back home. If you have to act like you heard about the death, then came racing back from some business trip, do so, but in no way do I want the police to scratch their heads over why the owner of the Jeep started sleeping at his office the night his Jeep blew up. Do you understand?”

  I said, “Yes, sir.”

  “Pike, that’s an order. No more conspiracy theories. No more hiding out looking for the bad man. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir, I got it.”

  “Give me an update tomorrow.”

  “Will do.”

  But I had no intention of standing down.

  He said, “Pike, I’m sorry. We all are.”

  I said, “Thank you, sir.” And hung up, thinking about my options.

  George was probably right, and I just didn’t want to face the fact that Kurt had died by a random event. The same thing had happened with my wife and daughter years ago, and it had ripped me apart, the senselessness of the loss driving me into a world of self-destruction.

  A few years ago I had been the defender of freedom, a man at the pinnacle of the Special Operations community. One that was called upon when the worst had happened. Or so I’d thought. I’d answered that calling even when my wife had begged me to quit, after years of combat. I’d agreed to stop, but I’d done one more deployment because the mission was a siren call. A thing that defined me more than my family.

  Until I’d learned that it didn’t.

  While I was gone, both my wife and daughter had been murdered, and it had shredded me, like pulling a tree out of the ground, the roots ripping in pain. I was the one that was supposed to be in danger. I was the one protecting them. And I had learned a hard truth: everything I’d done to protect my nation had done nothing to protect what I held dear.

  The loss had caused what I call my dark time. Something that was joked about on my team, but never in my presence, because it was very real. All too real. I had dropped into an abyss that no one should ever enter. A place where I came close to attacking anyone I met in the hope that they would kill me and relieve the pain. I was too big of a coward to do it myself, and was willing to force someone else to do the honors, even if it meant me defending myself and killing them instead. Because I couldn’t let someone kill me.

  It was a bad, bad time, and I wondered if maybe I was subconsciously trying to prevent the beast from returning, looking for a meaning to Kurt’s loss.

  I’d done that with my family, and in the end, their deaths were just as nonsensical as this one. That fact had almost crushed me once, and I was working mightily to prevent the beast from coming back.

  This morning, I woke up in my sleeping bag disoriented, unsure of where I was, and the explosion had come back—the one that had ripped Kurt’s life away. Last night, as I prepared to go to sleep, I’d recognized where I was headed—recognized the symptoms of the scar tissue ripping, the beast wanting to roam—and I’d wanted Jennifer with me, the one person who could stop the slide I was on. The one person who had seen me when I’d slipped over the edge before. But I’d abandoned her to deal with the fallout of Kurt’s death, while I hid trying to make sense of the disaster.

  I stared vacantly at the television across the room, an old movie playing with the sound muted. I picked up my phone to check in with Jennifer, and it dinged with an iMessage, the number blocked.

  I read, You in Charleston?

  I figured it was from someone in my past who wanted to get together, but now was not the time. Before I could reply, my phone dinged again, Sorry. This is Nung.

  What the hell? Nung was a crazy half-breed Thai mercenary I’d worked with a couple of times, and I’d helped his younger brother get into a high-class boarding school as payment. Another time, he’d helped me and ended up with the ill-gotten gains of a group of Irish terrorists for the effort. He was spot-on deadly in a crisis, but had the moral compass of a computer. I had no idea why he’d be contacting me. I hadn’t seen him in years.

  I typed, Long time no see. Yes, I’m in Charleston, you here?

  Will be tomorrow. In air now, on Wifi. Need to talk.

  This just got stranger and stranger, but given this was coming from Nung, it was par for the course, because I was pretty sure his middle name was “strange.”

  I typed, About what?

  In person. Don’t want this over wifi.

  I narrowed my eyes, watching the bubbles form another message. When they appeared, all of my previous doubts evaporated like a dream fragmenting in the light of dawn.

  You and Jennifer are in danger. Watch your back until I arrive.

  I felt the beast stir, the first tendrils of anger slithering out, escaping the scar tissue of pain I kept bottled up.

  Someone is hunting me.

  And now it was my turn.

  I dialed the personal number of a guy who worked in the Taskforce Network Operations Center—colloquially known as the “hacking cell”—hoping that because of the death of Colonel Hale, he would be home and able to answer his phone. He did.

  “Hey, Pike. We’re all devastated up here. It’s terrible news.”

  “Thanks, Creed, but that’s not why I’m calling. I need some video work done. I need the best you can do to give me facial ID of two men. They’re pretty grainy right now.”

  Bartholomew Creedwater was my go-to computer geek at the Taskforce, not only because he was very good at his job, but because he was willing to bend the rules if I asked. Even given that, I could hear the suspicion leaking out of the phone.

  “Pike, we’re all on stand-down until they can sort out what to do about Colonel Hale. They’ve even given stand-down orders to anyone operational who’s not in the midst of a critical mission.”

  I said, “I know that. I just got off the phone with George. I’m not asking for covert penetration of a computer network. I’m asking you to enhance a video from the surveillance cameras on my house. As a friend. But you can’t tell anyone at the Taskforce you’re doing it.”

  I heard nothing for a moment, then, “You want me to keep it secret? Why?”

  “Because I’m going to kill them.”

  Chapter 7

  One more person did a double take at Luca’s appearance and Simon chuckled, saying, “You look about as out of place here as those two dykes we saw on the canoes yesterday.”

  Luca grunted and said, “They might think we’re a couple, but I promise, if they do, they know who’s the man and who’s the bitch.”

  Simon frowned, but he couldn’t debate the sentiment, given Luca’s size. He was a mountain of flesh, a man who clearly spent more time in the gym than he did at anything else, his ropes of muscle rippling with any movement. With a ponytail of brown hair and a brow that looked straight out of a documentary on cavemen, he stood out at the Amazon jungle resort. But then again, he’d stand out anywhere except on the set of a Conan movie.

  His teammate, Simon, was lean and wiry, with a tribal art tattoo crawling out of his shirt and up his neck, giving him a seedy appearance of having just left prison. Both of them made little effort to blend in, but that wasn’t a threat, as the lodge catered to foreigners of all stripes. They weren’t the strangest couple at the lodge, but they were
the only one who didn’t care about the extravagant expanse of jungle surrounding the grounds.

  Every other patron traveled to this location to see the Amazon up close. To experience one of the few remaining rain forests on earth. Luca and Simon couldn’t care less. They were here for one reason only: the elimination of the ethics lawyer for the Petrobras oil company.

  Just a year before, that position inside Petrobras had been a joke. A whitewash of any and all ethical violations perpetrated by the giant conglomerate, giving the company a veneer of respectability while the executive in the position had to swallow that his mission was to ignore his mission. Now, as the Carwash bribery scandal continued to reach into the corporation, snagging executives left and right, the position had grown teeth, aided by a career prosecutor who was looking for the truly corrupt ones to prove that Petrobras was a good, noble institution that only had a few bad eggs.

  As such, the executive needed to go. The bad eggs wanted some breathing room.

  Simon said, “Hurry up. That damn family is headed in, and you know they’re going to sit on the couch and suck up the bandwidth. Tell me we can execute, because I’m sick of this jungle shit. Let Kolva come clean up the mess. It’s his target.”

  The executive was a new target for them. There were three teams in Brazil, and each had a mission to execute, without any coordination. Luca and Simon’s original target had been the ombudsman from Petrobras—someone who was determined to prove she was above reproach, and someone who held significant sway on the assignment of concessions in the lucrative Lulu oil fields off the coast. They’d followed her to Salvador, developed a pattern of life, and were prepared to eliminate her when Simon had recognized a threat. An American he’d encountered before, on another continent. One who was skilled enough to almost kill him.