Ultraviolent: Book Six in The Mad Mick Series

by Franklin Horton

  The people in that room were celebrating and he could only imagine one thing they might be celebrating. It had to be the launch of a counter-strike against the Macallan Collective. They'd successfully infiltrated the organization and learned of its plans to move against the high-ranking officials on the cruise ship. They'd compromised that operation and were attempting to eradicate anyone standing in the way of their objectives.

  Ricardo understood that. It was the nature of politics. But these were the people responsible for Doc's death. These were the people responsible for shooting his chopper out of the air and putting a contract out on his head. These were the people after his friend Hoffman. Worst of all, Ricardo now understood who the mole in the organization had to be.

  It was Terrence Long, a man Ricardo had worked with numerous times over the past decade. He'd sold out Ricardo, he'd sold out Hoffman, and he'd sold out the Macallan Collective. In the eyes of many, his actions had now sold out the American people. There would be no stopping their plan to use humanitarian aid as a mechanism for disarming and manipulating the citizens of the United States.

  Long would have to pay and he would have to pay tonight.

  11

  Mt. Vernon, Virginia

  Ricardo retreated and found a quiet spot several houses away. He flipped his nightvision up, retrieved his sat phone from a pocket, and placed a call to Hoffman's secure phone. He needed to alert him to what he'd found at Long's house. There was no answer. Ricardo had a bad feeling about it, though there were many reasons Hoffman might not answer. The old man could be asleep, passed out drunk, or simply away from his phone.

  He could also be quite dead.

  Ricardo leaned back against his pack, took a deep breath, and tried to organize his thoughts. There was no doubt in his mind that he needed to confront Long tonight. If he left and delayed taking action, who knew if the two would ever cross paths again. There was no guarantee of that so it had to be now.

  He fully expected that Long would deny everything if confronted. He'd offer excuses for what Ricardo had seen. Perhaps he'd say he was acting in some undercover capacity, trying to gather information about their enemy. Long had been in intelligence for his entire career. In fact, he was so good at what he did that they put him in charge of training spies at The Farm. He was one of the best, and what point was there questioning someone so adept at hiding the truth? He’d never be able to trust Long’s responses.

  No, Ricardo knew all he needed to know. He would trust his gut. He was confident that what he'd seen through that window was a group of people celebrating the accomplishment of an important strategic objective—the destruction of the Macallan Collective. With that roadblock gone, there would be no enemy of consequence to stand in the way of them restructuring the country in accordance with their agenda.

  The only unresolved question was when exactly did he pay this visit to Long? Did he wait until after the man's dinner party was over and the guests had left? It would certainly be easier to manage one prisoner than several.

  But if he did so, that left a roomful of powerful enemies who would still be actively trying to stamp out any resistance to their plans. He couldn't forget that one of the tertiary events they were so merrily toasting was the shooting down of his chopper. They were celebrating his death, the death of his associates, and the death of America as a sovereign nation.

  No, those dinner guests didn't get a pass. If Long died, they should die too.

  Ricardo let out a long sigh and carefully calculated what needed to be done. If he was to act while all of those guests were present, he'd have to contend with the security team too. He couldn't risk being interrupted.

  He stood and took off his long wool coat, folded it neatly, and placed it on the backpack. The air was chilly but he'd soon forget about that. He located all of his spare mags for the P90 and made sure they were accessible in the pouches of his plate carrier. He switched out his current mags for subsonic loads, then threaded a suppressor onto the P90 and his handgun. The weapons wouldn't truly be silent but might be quiet enough that the generator would drown out his shots.

  Ricardo double-checked his kit, dropped his nightvision over his eyes, and returned to the fence surrounding Long's property. He climbed over and headed for the backyard first. He placed the P90 in semi-automatic and powered up his holographic sight, making certain it was in nightvision mode. He shouldered the weapon and looked for the sentry on the dock. When he found him, he put a single round in the center of his face. The man fell backward into the water without crying out, the sound of his splash swallowed by the roar of the diesel generator.

  One down.

  Staying out of sight of the French doors, Ricardo sprinted around the side of the house where the generator was located. The three guards in Long's front yard were no challenge at all. Between their comms headsets and the sound of the generator, they didn't pick up that they were coming under fire. All three were dead before they even knew what was going on.

  Ricardo rushed to each of them, confirming the downed men were out of the fight. He moved closer to the street, crouching and sighting his weapon over a low brick wall. The three working the midpoint in the street, positioned halfway between Long's house and the roadblock, were standing nearly elbow to elbow. They were too close to each other to pick off one at a time. Ricardo switched to full auto and stitched them with a controlled burst.

  Without changing positions, he targeted the two distant men standing on his side of the black Hummer. They were moving around, reacting either to the sound of the suppressed gunfire or to the whistle of rounds cutting through the air. Although they may have even heard the cry of one of the fallen men, they were still uncertain of what was going on. Unable to see their attacker in the darkness, they were hesitant to fire a shot in response.

  They moved to take cover. When one dashed for a clump of hedges Ricardo caught him with a burst center mass. He fell in the street and didn't move. The remaining man took cover behind the Hummer. Ricardo changed mags, hopped the brick wall, then flattened himself in the street. In the glow of his nightvision, he could clearly see the man's legs beneath the vehicle.

  He fired another burst and the man cried out as his ankles were shattered. He fell to the ground, writhing and yelling out. Ricardo directed another burst beneath the vehicle and the man fell still. He scrambled to his feet and worked his way up the dark street, confirming that each man was permanently out of the fight.

  Ricardo felt nothing at this sudden eruption of violence and death. There wasn't a single filament of squeamishness or sentimentality in his body. There was no room for feelings like that in his line of work. While his operators and employees might look at him as a businessman who didn't get his hands dirty, they really had no clue who he was. They didn't know what he'd done in his life or what he was capable of.

  With the security detail neutralized, Ricardo took a moment to stand there in the quiet street and let his adrenaline dissipate. He performed another tactical reload, switching the partially-spent mag for a full one. He shook out his limbs and calmed his breathing. A man thought and performed better when his blood wasn't boiling with the heat of battle. When he felt calm and collected again he returned to Long's house.

  He strode through the iron gates and up the circular drive, directly to the front door. He carefully tried the heavy bronze handle and smiled. Long was so confident in his security detail that he hadn’t even locked the front door. Ricardo pushed on it gently. As was often the case in high-end homes, the door was hung on expensive ball-bearing hinges and opened without a sound.

  Ricardo scanned the entry foyer as he stepped inside. It was dark, with most of the lights on the front of the house turned off. He swung the door shut behind him, closing it with the handle turned so that there was no click from the latch when it shut.

  He wondered if there were any guards or household staff inside. While there might be a cook, intuition told him that Long would have kept any security men outside. Men in
that profession often talked among themselves and Long would be hesitant to let them overhear anything sensitive. One could never know when someone might take valuable information they overheard and try to sell it to a competitor.

  Ricardo proceeded down a hall, weapon at his shoulder. He followed the sound of laughter and loud conversation, focused on the splash of ambient light reflecting off a pale wall. His steps were quiet, offering no warning of his approach. When he stepped into the glowing dining room every smile faded. None of these people knew Ricardo but they understood an armed man with a gun leveled on them was not there to deliver good news.

  Long was the last to react. His back was to Ricardo and the only clue he had that there was a stranger in their midst was the change of expression on his guests' faces. Long sat there with his wine glass in the air, not turning and not moving. "I take it we have a guest?"

  "Hands on the table, please," Ricardo asked, ever polite. He eased further into the room, keeping to Long's left so he didn't have his back against the wall of glass doors.

  Long swiveled his eyes to get a look at his new guest. "Why, Ricardo, it's you. I thought I recognized that refined European accent. Why don't you put down that weapon and join us for a drink?"

  Ricardo scanned the surface of the table. Not everyone had complied with his request to place their hands on the table. The U.N. advisor was particularly defiant, glaring at Ricardo with seething hatred. Ricardo aimed his weapon directly at the man.

  "I do not take kindly to having a gun pointed at me," Sanjay Thongwaitaipassan said flatly.

  "I don't take kindly to having my chopper shot from the air and nearly all of my staff slaughtered," Ricardo shot back. "Now please comply with my request."

  "Like Lazarus, you have risen from the dead," Long pronounced, refusing to show surprise or fear at Ricardo's appearance. Perhaps he held out hope that he could somehow defuse this situation.

  Ricardo spotted Sanjay's elbow moving away from his body just a fraction. He was changing the angle of his arm and reaching for something, likely a handgun. Ricardo touched the trigger of his P90 and the rifle spat. The 5.7mm round punched a neat hole in Sanjay's forehead. The man slumped in his chair and something heavy dropped to the floor beneath the table. Ricardo suspected it was the gun he had been going for.

  There were controlled intakes of breath around the table, and someone almost cried out but stifled it. When Ricardo scanned the surface of the table, he saw that all hands were where he wanted them to be.

  "Why is it that people don't listen until someone dies?" he mused. "You had to know that was coming."

  "That was unfortunate," Long muttered. He still hadn't moved a muscle. One hand rested delicately on the edge of the table and the other held a wine glass aloft, inches from his face. He looked as if he'd been about to propose another toast.

  "I could go on about unfortunate events, but I doubt they'd weigh as heavily upon this group as they weigh upon me,” said Ricardo. “It appears we have different standards of unfortunate. Indeed, different goals altogether. Isn't that right, Terrence?"

  "You know this man?" McGlothlin, the tech billionaire asked.

  "He was an associate,” Long admitted. “In fact, we discussed him earlier. He's the gentleman who contracted with the Macallan Collective to run the strike against our friends on the cruise ship Shandong."

  McGlothlin's mouth tightened. "I thought you said he was dead?"

  Ricardo flashed a quick smile, one that didn't reach his eyes, which still seethed with hate. "Obviously not."

  McGlothlin made the mistake of looking a little too upset that Ricardo was still alive. How was a man supposed to react to something like that? Finding it hard to ignore McGlothlin's disappointment at his survival, Ricardo snapped the P90 in his direction and put a round just above his ear.

  Blood sprayed the congresswoman sitting beside him. Her mouth opened in horror and she raised her hands in front of her face, staring at her pale, blood-speckled fingers. McGlothlin toppled into an undignified heap at her side. The congresswoman kicked in a panic, trying to shake McGlothlin's hand off of her bare ankle.

  "Now was that necessary?" Long asked. "Must you terrorize my colleagues?"

  Ricardo turned his rifle on Long. "That's rich, coming from you. I'd have had a similar reaction had I been at my offices when a hit team killed all of my employees. That was unnecessary."

  Long took a sip of his wine and placed his glass on the table, both hands resting palms-down on the edge of the table. "You understand how this game works, Ricardo. You've been playing it for a long time. There are players and there are pawns. Not to sound harsh, but your staff were simply pawns. You too are just a pawn."

  Ricardo swung the weapon again. With two rapid shots, he dispensed with the bloodstained congresswoman and the political strategist at her side. The remainder of the group flinched but didn't cry out.

  "So did I just kill two pawns or two players?" Ricardo asked.

  Long shook his head with disgust at what was unfolding around him. "You have killed players, old friend. You'll never get away with this."

  Without taking his eyes from Long, Ricardo shifted the P90 and put three quick rounds into the news anchor. He fell face-forward into his dessert course, a long croak escaping him as he expired in his crème brûlée.

  Ricardo glared at Long. "That's for calling me an old friend. You should understand that I'd find that offensive considering the circumstances."

  Long's jaw tightened. "You won’t get out of here alive. I have security who—"

  "You had security," Ricardo corrected. "They're all dead, just like your guests will soon be."

  Long looked down at the table and fought to control his breathing as the gravity of the situation finally settled on him. "This is a waste, Ricardo. Your operation in Georgia was blown. The Macallan Collective has been exposed. All of the members of that organization have either been killed or will be dead shortly. Your actions here accomplish nothing."

  Ricardo shook his head. "I have my best man in Georgia. Don't count him out. The op may have been compromised, but that doesn't mean he's coming home with his tail between his legs. He's probably on that cruise ship right now slitting throats and thinning the ranks of you traitors."

  Long flinched at the use of that word. "I guess we'll know soon enough. We have a clean-up team on the way to Cumberland Island right now. You should know that if we don't find your operators there we'll notify the ship and they'll flush them out like rats."

  "There's no way you people can win this," the remaining congresswoman said, speaking for the first time.

  Ricardo sighed, then shot her too. He was growing weary of talking.

  "I do believe you've killed all my dinner guests," Long said flatly.

  "As you well know, sir, it's a matter of attrition. You've made a significant effort toward reducing the numbers on my team. I intend to devote myself to repaying the favor."

  Long stared at his blood-spattered walls, the pooling blood on the tabletop, and the array of bodies. "Clearly."

  Ricardo went to the opposite end of the table and shook a body loose from the chair. He took a seat, never taking his P90 off Long. He understood that he couldn't give a man like Long any opportunity to strike back or he'd take it. Ricardo was certain he wasn't defenseless. At a minimum he had a firearm concealed somewhere on his body. He probably had several stored within reach, as well as multiple methods of stabbing an enemy.

  The two men stared at each other until Long broke the silence with a shrug. "I guess there's no point in me telling you I was working undercover? That I was a double-agent working to learn the enemy's plans so I could report back to the Collective?"

  Ricardo shook his head. "I wouldn't believe you."

  Long flashed a charming smile. "Can't blame a guy for trying."

  "Actually, I can," Ricardo said. "I was asking myself why you'd do this until you made the statement about players and the pawns. Now I get it. You were tired of being a p
awn. You were tired of decades of accomplishments never being recognized because you'd chosen a profession that didn't offer public accolades. After a career in the shadows, you wanted your moment in the sun. I guess you hoped they'd reward you with a nice position in the spotlight once the government was fully operational again?"

  Long's smile faded. "I'm not interested in your opinions on my psychological motivations. If you're going to shoot me, go ahead and do it. I'm growing bored of you." Long spread his arms in a welcoming gesture, as if encouraging Ricardo to bring it on.

  With no warning, Ricardo squeezed off a shot. Despite his bravado, Long hadn't expected the shot and flinched. Then he cried out with pain when he realized the round had punched a hole through his right palm.

  "Fuck!" Long bellowed.

  "I remember that you're right-handed. Consider that a safety precaution. Of course, I'm sure you can shoot with both hands, but I doubt you carry your weapon positioned for an offhand draw. Now get to your feet. We're going outside."

  Ricardo stood and edged around the table, weapon still on Long. Long wrapped his cloth napkin around his bleeding hand, scowling at Ricardo, and got to his feet. Ricardo gestured toward the French doors and Long led the way. Carrying the P90 in one hand, Ricardo picked up the pitcher of water from the table with the other. He kept a few steps back from Long and followed him out onto the patio. Light poured through the French doors, allowing the men to clearly see each other.

  "Cool night, isn't it?" Ricardo said. "I'd guess it's in the thirties."

  Long didn't reply until Ricardo dumped the pitcher of water on him. Then he sputtered, "What was the point of that?"

  Ricardo grinned. "Speeds up hypothermia."

  "Crude," Long said dismissively. "Thug tactics."

  Ricardo pointed at the ground. "Lie down."

  Long scoffed at the suggestion. "Really?"

  Ricardo's reply came in the form of a burst from the P90. Catching Long across the bridge of one foot, the flurry of rounds nearly cut his foot in half. Long lurched backward and fell, grabbing his foot and screaming.