“Where is your mother?”
“She drove out to Flagstaff to visit her sister.”
Carl nodded. “She’s probably safe, then. I get the feeling that this op is centered around me, in New Mexico and Mexico.”
Cummings grabbed a dead man’s P90. She seemed to consider something about the weapon, then tossed it aside and kept the MP5. She led her daughter into her bedroom and returned wearing a jacket and holding a handful of magazines from the dead commando in there. She stuffed the extra mags in her jacket pocket and slung the MP5 over her shoulder.
Carl said, “Seems to me that a P90 would come in handy if we run into more of these guys.”
“The MP5 uses nine-millimeter rounds, and in a pinch we can get that ammo pretty much anywhere. The P90 is a better killing weapon, but it uses controlled military ammo that we can’t get more of. Better to stick with common weapons with inexpensive and interchangeable rounds.”
“Whatever. Let’s go.”
As Cummings got her daughter into a coat from the closet adjacent to the door, Carl heard one of the commandos groan. It was the first man through the door that Carl had hit with a ricochet off his helmet. Somehow, the man had survived Carl’s second bullet, a direct shot through his face shield. The lower portion of his jaw was a mess. Carl rolled the commando from his side and onto his back. He had military gear, but had unkempt hair showing under his combat helmet, and wore a blood-soaked bushy mustache and a scruffy beard. He looked like one of Carl’s mercenaries, which gave Carl an idea.
He knelt beside the man and said, “You work for money, so there’s no need for you to die here. Tell me who you work for.” He knew the grunt soldier wouldn’t know who the adversary was, but his boss or commander might know.
“The Unit.”
“Your injury isn’t critical.” It was. “If you want to live, give me a name.”
“They’re going to kill you.”
“Mmm-hmmm.” Carl glanced around at the bodies. “Yep, they’re doing pretty good so far. Give me a name.”
In the commando’s eyes, Carl saw certain inevitability. The man knew he was going to die, so Carl didn’t bother asking for any further information. Calmly, he aimed his Glock between the man’s eyes.
“Last chance.” The man said nothing, so Carl pulled the trigger. He stood and looked over at Cummings and her daughter. They both stood there staring at him.
“What?” he said with a shrug. “That’s what he was going to do to you, so fuck him.”
“Swear jar,” Lisette said again, but this time it was a whisper without conviction. It was accompanied by a little temper tantrum, a quick stomping of her feet, like she was more interested in getting him to stop cussing rather than collecting revenue for her swear jar.
He turned toward the door. He felt oddly safe, figuring if there were other commandos in the area, they would have joined the fray already. Either that, or the remainder had bugged out when their op went south to avoid law enforcement. Someone had to have reported all the gunfire.
Cummings and her daughter stepped near the blasted-out doorway, but stayed just out of arm’s reach from Carl. Lisette was a comical sight, dressed her pajamas, furry snow boots, and a snow coat. The girl had a muffler wrapped around her neck and wore a thickly knit hat and mittens.
Now that the shock of the home intrusion and the gunfight had waned, Carl saw abject fear in the girl’s eyes. She recognized him now. She remembered what he’d done to her, and he found it difficult to look her in the eye. He saw equal amounts of curiosity and animosity in Lenore’s eyes. He could tell his previous explanation was marginally sufficient. She needed more. He pulled loose a couple Velcro tabs on his combat vest and stuck his left fist as far up his back as he could reach. He grunted as he tried to massage the bruises from today and two days ago.
“This is the second time I’ve taken bullets for a girl.” He closed his eyes for a moment, then turned to face Cummings. “Melissa Mallory was the other. Thursday morning.” Lenore Cummings tented her eyebrows in confusion and he nodded. “This was all about the president’s daughter. Alfonso Reyes kidnapped the girl and because I look like him, McGrath’s people thought it was me.”
“Oh my God,” Cummings whispered quietly. “Your son…”
“Collateral damage.” He sighed. “Aaron McGrath used my son as bait. He thought he had leverage on Reyes.” They were both silent for a few seconds. “After everything that happened, after everything I’d done, I went down to Mexico to rescue Melissa. Try to put all this behind me. I saved the girl and brought her back home.” He took a breath. “Turns out, it isn’t quite over.”
“I’m sorry about your son.”
He nodded. “I know.” He looked her in the eye. “So is McGrath.” He took a deep breath. “This was all one big misunderstanding.” A clusterfuck, he recalled, was the old saying in the military. “That’s why I’m here. Melissa Mallory and her mom are still in danger. And…” He paused again and glanced at Cummings. “I have to find a way to make this right. For what I’ve done to people.”
Carl pulled out a cell phone and typed a single word into the text app. GO. It was his code word for the Chapmans. If he sent COME, that meant he was under duress and they were to leave the area immediately. GO meant the opposite. Not even ten seconds later, headlights brightened the street and slowly approached Cummings’s house. While waiting, Carl stared out the door, but he was looking back in time, not seeing the street.
“A month ago, I was just a regular guy. I was nobody. Now look at me.” He looked at the dead bodies on the floor. “Look at what I’ve become.” He waved a hand around the room and his gaze rested finally on Lisette. “Look at what I’ve done…to you.”
He couldn’t explain how a fifty-three-year-old program manager and real estate broker could take out a squad of professional killers without missing a shot. Granted, he had luck and surprise on his side—again—but there was no way he should have won that engagement. He’d turned into a killing machine.
“You’ve become a truly evil man, Mr. Johnson. I have no doubt about that,” Cummings said. “But you took bullets meant for my daughter. A mother doesn’t forget that kind of thing.”
“I wish I could just go home to my son and be innocent like ninety-nine percent of the rest of the population. Just be a normal guy again.”
Never going to happen. You chose the abyss, dude, and now you have to live there.
Outside, the Chapmans pulled up and he felt seriousness come over him again. He knew he had to get his head back in the game. He took a deep breath and checked his Glock. Cummings prepped her MP5.
“You.” Carl nodded at Lisette. “Grab onto the back of my vest and stay behind me.” But the girl shook her head and stayed behind her mom. “Look, I know you’re scared and you hate me, and you should. But that man,” Carl head-nodded up to the top of the stairs. “He was aiming at you, Lisette. Not me. They want you and your mom dead, and they’ll try again. But if you’re holding onto me, my vest and my body will protect you. The bullets won’t go through my vest and me, okay?”
The girl nodded, but still hesitated, and her mother said, “It’s okay, sweetie. Go ahead.”
Carl turned toward the open doorway and felt the girl grab onto his vest. “Okay, now I don’t think there’s any bad guys left, because I think we got all of them. But if there are and if I get shot, you just stay behind me and try to hold me between you and whoever is shooting, okay?” He glanced back and saw her nod. “Use me as a shield until you get to the car. You ready, Agent?”
“Let’s go. I got the left side.”
“I got right.”
The three of them moved cautiously across the yard to the curb. The SUV looked abandoned. In fact, Carl had to concentrate to recognize Todd’s head and torso smartly hunched over behind the steering wheel. He was as low as he could get in case bullets started flying. The front passenger door was slightly ajar as was the passenger door.
Carl squatted and cr
ab-walked sideways like he’d seen Palmer do, and his gun was stuck out in front of him in a two-handed grip. He scanned the street and the adjacent yards. The trio had covered half the distance to the SUV when the nightmare suddenly continued.
Cummings said, “I have movement! At the corner! He’s coming fast!”
Chapter 38
0020 hours MST Saturday
Albuquerque, NM
Cummings said, “Sweetie, run for the car!”
Carl added, “Go, Lisette! Go fast!”
The gangly girl let go of Carl’s vest and ran. Her two bow-tied, blond pigtails bounced outside her knit winter hat.
“Clear this side!” Cummings said.
“Go. I’ll cover.”
The agent’s front yard had no wall or fence or trees. It was a wide and deep expanse of brown grass that was probably a well-tended yard in the spring and summer. Carl knelt to one knee and took aim as the runner approached up the sidewalk. There was no street light between Cummings’s house and the corner, so all Carl saw was a running shadow. He aimed at the man’s head to avoid his body armor and was just about to pull the trigger when he heard Cummings’s harsh whisper.
“Jogger! Female!”
Carl stood suddenly and whipped his gun behind his back just as the jogger seemed to notice him. She waved.
He waved his left hand and said, “Hey, neighbor, whassup?”
She waved again and as she ran closer he saw in the dim light that she wore ear buds under her black sweatband. She’d probably heard his voice, but didn’t hear what he’d said, so she just waved a second time, then ran past him.
Carl took a last look around as he hurried to the SUV. The passenger door slammed shut and he jumped in the front and slammed the door, then glanced back to make sure everyone was inside.
He slapped Todd on the shoulder and said, “Go!”
The man put the pedal to the metal and the SUV shot forward.
Carl said, “Make your way back to Central, then go east out of town. “I have a safe house about sixty miles east of Albuquerque.”
Todd Chapman gasped like he’d heard something from a movie. “You have a safe house? Who the hell are you?”
“I’m a fucking terrorist, Todd. Of course I have a safe house.”
“Swear jar,” Lisette said.
Cummings said, “Language.” Carl turned sideways in his seat and looked at her. “Children,” she said.
He looked at the kids behind her who were also looking at him. He nodded. “Sorry.”
Carl studied the pitiful crew. They were all dressed like they were hastily rushed out of their homes with no time to prepare. Their entire world had suddenly erupted in violence, and they were all scared out of their wits. Cummings had crowded her daughter on the back bench with the Chapman teen and his twin six-year-old sisters, while Cummings sat on the second bench next to Anita.
Cummings said, “Hi Anita. We met at your father’s house in Virginia last year. I’m Lenore Cummings. I was interviewing for an assignment.”
Anita Chapman nodded, “I remember you.” The two women hugged awkwardly because of Anita’s metal jaw brace. Carl caught the gaze of the Chapman teen.
“Can you shoot, kid?”
“My name’s not kid.”
“I don’t know your name, so just answer the question.”
The boy hesitated, then said, “I can shoot.”
Carl ripped open the Velcro straps on his armor vest, shrugged out of it, and passed it back to the teen.
Carl said, “Put that on when we hit the interstate. If the adults go down, you’ll be the last one standing who can protect the children.”
Cummings turned in her seat. “What have you fired?”
The boy said, “A shotgun, a semiautomatic M-16, and a three-fifty-seven chrome grip.”
She said, “If I go down, grab my MP5. It’s like the M-16, but not as loud and has less kick. It has a faster firing rate, though, so you’ll rip right through a magazine on full auto in about two seconds flat. When it’s time to shoot, keep the selector switch on semi, okay?”
The teen nodded and Cummings turned back forward. She looked at Carl for a few seconds.
“What is this about? Why are these men coming after us?”
Carl took a deep breath. “Remember I told you Director McGrath and his people mistook me for the Mexican cartel leader who kidnapped the president’s daughter?” Cummings nodded. “Well, Alfonso Reyes and his crew did something to Melissa while she was in captivity for over a month. Right after I got her back, she had some kind of seizure. I discovered track marks on her arms from multiple injections.”
Todd looked over. “You’re working with them now? With the government?”
Carl ignored him. To Palmer, he repeated, “They did something to her. Gave her some kind of DNA-specific virus or something. Hours later, President Mallory collapsed in a coma.” He nodded at Anita. “Your father has it too.”
Carl turned forward in his seat as Todd guided the SUV onto I-40 eastbound. He gazed out the windshield at the cluster of Uptown office buildings and restaurants sliding by on the left. There was very little traffic on the interstate at that hour. Carl considered his own progression from innocent civilian to domestic terrorist. He’d redefined who his enemies were, and McGrath and Shirley Mallory were not among them.
Carl said to Todd Chapman, “Let me have the phone I gave you.” He took the battery out and tossed the phone and the battery out the window.”
A few minutes later, Carl said, “We’ve all been manipulated, caught up in a masterfully planned plot to assassinate the first woman president. I’m going to find out who my adversary is so I can learn why he thinks it’s okay to kill children.”
Chapter 39
0130 hours MST Saturday
Nuevo Casas Grandes Airport, Northern Mexico
Nancy Palmer stumbled out of the tiny bathroom and resumed her seat by the wall opposite the desk. Just the effort of walking took an enormous amount of energy, or so it seemed. Her entire body ached. Every muscle screamed with fatigue. Even breathing seemed like a chore. She could never recall being so tired and sore in her life.
The smell from the over-used bathroom permeated the entire office. Half a dozen people had been getting sick in there for three or four hours. Everyone was sick. At first, they attempted to maintain some sense of cleanliness in the bathroom; each person used the facility and cleaned up after themselves. That courtesy, however, was the first casualty of the virus. Other symptoms developed very fast. First, the Reyes ladies and the mercs started complaining of migraine-like headaches. Then, nausea struck everyone nearly at the same time. Then, came shakes and seizures, both mild and severe. Then, came loss of control of bodily functions.
Over the last hour, only a couple of people made it to the bathroom in time, and several were too weak and sickened to even try. Palmer was now the only person with any mobility other than the co-pilot, David Blick, who had yet to show any symptoms.
Unlike everyone else, Blick contracted the virus only a few hours ago when he’d helped Merc Four drag in the wounded from the Reyes compound. They’d been trapped underground near the end of the escape tunnel for several hours, before finally managing to extricate their SUV. With Merc Four driving, they made their way to the Nuevo Casas Grandes airport.
Blick leaned with his butt against the desk facing her. He stood as still as a statue and she guessed he was in shock, perhaps unwilling to accept what was happening to them. He might not be helpful when she came up with a plan. So far though, there was no plan.
For a moment, she watched the tiny television sitting atop the file cabinet in the corner beside the desk. Everything was so clear now, but they had been so wrong before. She knew who their adversary was, and she knew he had beaten them. He’d sent her and Carl off on a wild goose chase completely unrelated to the real endgame. The game was over. It had been over for a long time. They just hadn’t seen it. The adversary had head-faked them.
&n
bsp; Palmer looked down at the series of reports she’d brought back from Orizaga’s safe. The collection of documents on her tiny table was just the tip of the iceberg. She’d also skimmed the data on the thumb drive over the hours since Carl’s departure and came away with a clear strategic picture of what they were really up against.
The virus was not, in fact, a DNA-targeted concoction aimed at the president. Someone on Carl’s team had unknowingly brought the virus to the meeting earlier that day. Of that she had no doubt, but she had no idea who it might have been. The adversary had found a way to infect someone. The documents stated that the onset of symptoms began as early as six hours or as late as fifteen hours after infection. Everyone, including herself, began getting sick at right about the ten-hour point.
That meant Carl had the virus too and was probably sick at that very moment. The report stated the virus was spread only by touch, and Carl had hugged, fist-bumped, or shaken hands with everyone at the meeting. And she’d kissed him. He was definitely infected. She wondered if he even knew what was happening to him.
He’d had time to prevent the murder of those families before becoming ill, although she had no idea if he had actually done so. He’d blindly charged back to Albuquerque to rescue women and children without a plan and without any way to recruit the kind of talent he would need to go up against trained Unit killers. That was his methodology, always doing the unexpected, the insane. Create a plan on the move. Keep the opponent guessing and rocking back on their heels. That was how he had been so successful against the TER and the FBI for over a month.
In the operation-planning arena, Carl could analyze what-if scenarios in his head while an op was ongoing. He didn’t have to write things down or discuss them. He rivaled Aaron McGrath in that regard, able to change the direction of an op in real time, even as new parameters were presented. He was always two or three steps ahead of his opponent.
American Terrorist Trilogy Page 52
